01 CHAPTER - Planet chaser

Transcription

Apes to
Angels
Man Reaches His Omega Point
This Book is Dedicated to
Fr. Andreas Pathy,
a Fine Sample of Future Humanity
LTD – Media Publications
Chennai - India
© Copyright LTD Media
All rights reserved. This book is printed in India. No part of this book may be used or
reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case
of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Contact Details:
Fr. Rayappa A. Kasi, A. Kattupadi Post, Vellore – 632011, India.
Website: www.planetschaser.com
Email – soundchaser@vsnl.com
Mobile Phone - 09443537885
Apes to Angels – Man Reaches His Omega Point
Day of Publication 24.5.2011
LTD Media Publication, Chennai, India
Other Publications from the Author:
1. Earth-The Lost Paradise of Happiness, 2009
2. Global Warming - Everything You Want to Know! 2009
3. Biosphere - The Fragility of Our Natural Heritage, 2010
4. Lithosphere - A Destructive Creator, 2010
5. Hydrosphere - The Giver of Life, 2010
6. Atmosphere – A Thin Line Between Life and Death, 2010
7. Earth – designed for Biodiversity, 2010
8. Youth – An Avatar of New Earth, 2011
Front Jacket Illustration:
This mystifying-virtual-reality-modern art symbolizes Creation—God in All and All in
God: In the beginning there was the Word, and the Word was sound—OM—the big
bang. This is how Creation sprang into being: Eye of God in the centre—the start of the
universe: To the right (west) and left (east)—the expansion of the universe, galaxies
like elliptical, spiral, barred-spiral and irregular; pulsars with X rays; distant quasars
with their high energy output; young stars shining and old stars dying called
supernovas; gravity gone mad black holes: To the bottom (south)—the birth of time
like epochs, periods, ages, eons, space like, guons, muons, quarks, atoms, molecules,
matter like solids, liquids, gasses, plasmas; energy like gravity, electro-magnetic force,
strong and weak nuclear forces, leading Creation to, Galactic Consciousness: To the
top (north)—the evolution of life, one cell, multi-cell, fish, non-vertebrates, vertebrates,
amphibians, vegetation, reptiles, insects, birds, mammals, monkeys, apes, awareness,
consciousness, enlightenment and—man transforming into an angel, leading to more
complexity to Christ—the Image of God—while inherently connected to all life that
came before us and continue to perceive their whisperings, impulses, mutations,
genetic make-ups hard-wired into our DNA and their cosmic affiliation: The patches of
deep blue in the background symbolizes the strangest exotic particles in Cosmology—
dark matter and dark energy, that is the ultimate source of good and evil which will
determine whether the cosmos will collapse, freeze, or be ripped to oblivion: The edges
of all directions point out to the—Spirit of God—the creative and salvific force guiding
creation and universe to—Cosmic Omega Point.
Cover Page designed by Rajeev Karun
Cover Photo – Courtesy of Google
Price :
500.00
US$ 25
Content
The Beginning
XI
Foreword
XXIII
Prologue
XXXI
Chapter I - Let us Make Man … A Story of Man
●
Hominoids as Catarrhine Primates
2
●
Hominids – A Leap Toward Man
7
●
Heredity, Genetics and Human Physical Characteristics
9
●
Sahelanthropus tchadensis - (7 to 6 Million Years Old)
●
Orrorin tugenensis - (6 Million Years Old)
12
●
Ardipithecus ramidus - (5.8 to 4.4 Million Years Old)
12
●
The Australopithecines
13
●
Laetoli Footprints in the Ashes of Time
14
●
Australopithecus “The Southern Ape”
16
●
Australopithecus anamensis - (4.2 to 3.8 Million Years Old)
17
●
Australopithecus afarensis - (3.8 to 3 Million Years Old)
18
●
Kenyanthropus platyops - (3.5 Million Years Old)
21
●
Australopithecus africanus - (3.1 to 2.1 Million Years Old)
22
●
Australopithecus garhi - (2.4 Million Years Old)
22
●
Australopithecus sediba (2 to 1.7 Million Years old)
23
●
Paranthropus
23
●
Paranthropus aethiopicus - (2.6 to 2.2 Million Years Old)
23
●
Paranthropus boisei – Known as ‘Zinj’ (2.2 to 1.2 MYO)
24
●
Paranthropus robustus - (2 to 1 Million Years Old)
27
●
The First Humans
27
●
Prehistoric Stone Tools
28
●
Homo rudolfensis - (2.4 to 1.8 Million Years Old)
30
●
Homo habilis: Handy Man
30
●
Homo georgicus
31
●
Mrs Ples
32
●
Homo ergaster - (1.5 Million to 400,000 Years Old)
32
11
●
Out of Africa
34
●
Homo erectus - (1.8 Million to 400,000 Years Old)
35
●
Big Boy: “Turkana Boy”
36
●
Peking Man
37
●
The Master of the Planet
37
●
Homo heidelbergensis - (600,000 to 200,000 Years Old)
40
●
Homo sapiens sapiens
42
●
Neanderthals - (230,000 to 29,000 Years Old)
43
●
Homo sapiens - (From 200,000 Years to Present Time)
45
●
Cro-Magnon - (40,000 to 10,000 Years Old)
46
●
Neolithic People: The First Farmers
47
●
Human Saga Written in DNA – Y Chromosome in Asia
49
●
Indian Adam and Indian Eve
54
●
Human Beings Became the Story of God and Church
58
●
The Origin of the Individual
63
●
Great Apes – Our Nearest Relatives
64
●
Chromosomes Between Humans and Apes
65
●
Orangutan – 97% Human DNA
69
●
Gorilla – 98% Human DNA
70
●
Bonobo – 98% Human DNA
72
●
Chimpanzee – 99% Human DNA
76
●
Human – The Third Chimpanzee
79
●
Small or Lesser Apes – Gibbons and Siamangs
82
●
Am I Still Evolving?
84
●
Bibliography
89
Chapter II – Story of Man Reaches its Omega Point
●
Homo sapiens to Homo sentiens: 5000 BC to 7000 AD
●
Homo sentiens to Homo magnificus – 7000 AD to 14000 AD
103
Homo magnificus to Homo saliens:
Awareness – 14000 AD to 24000 AD
112
Homo saliens to Homo illuminans – 24000 AD to 150,000 AD
125
●
●
94
Homo illuminans to Homo novus:
New Man – 150,000 AD to 850,000 AD
133
Homo novus to Homo angelicus:
The Ethereal – 850,000 to 1 Million AD
139
Homo angelicus to Homo Imago Dei –
1 Million AD to 2 Million AD
152
●
The Matrix of Imago Dei
155
●
No Man is an Island: Pope Benedict XVI – Caritas in Veritate
161
●
Human Hubristic Blunders – Time of Anarchy
163
●
Unihuman - Divergence or convergence
166
●
The Noosphere – A Global Positioning System (GPS)
168
●
Evolution of Noosphere
170
●
The Omega Point – The End of the Line
171
●
It’s Time for Cosmic Liturgy
174
●
Bibliography
177
●
●
●
Three Engines That Power Human Evolution
Religion; Science; Language, Culture and Arts
Chapter III – Engine Number One – Religion
Role of Good Old Pesky Religions in Human Evolution
●
The Opaqueness of Prehistoric Documents on Religion
181
●
The Spiritual Ape
185
●
Homo religious: The Axial Age – The Birth of Conscience
187
●
Some Characteristics of Popular Religions
189
●
Religion is a Face of Humanity
194
●
Religion is About Belonging
197
●
Many Faces of the Divine
198
●
Faces of Eternal Themes in Religions
200
●
Face of Liberation in Hinduism
203
●
Face of Enlightenment in Buddhism
207
●
Face of Awareness in Tao
211
●
Face of the Only One in Monotheistic Religions
213
●
Face of Triadic Monotheism
214
●
Dimensions of the Divine
216
●
Face of a New Epoch
218
●
My Face as Catholic priest – Year of Priests
220
●
Face of Religious Celibacy in Human Evolution
224
●
Face of Hope in New Age - -Believing without Belonging
230
●
Face of Faith in Godless Societies
233
●
Modern Face of Religion – Revival of Religion
236
●
Religions Revive in the Lives of the Poor
238
●
God Against Religions
241
●
Face of the Kingdom of God – Spirituality versus Religion
248
●
Do Religions come in Handy?
254
●
Difference Between Spirituality and Religion
262
●
Youth and Religion – Contemplation or Conversion
264
●
Kick-Out Religious Bigotry
269
●
Spirituality will Continue
269
●
Bibliography
273
Chapter IV – Engine Number Two – Science
Role of Science in Human Evolution
●
We Believe All that is Seen and Unseen
277
●
Stone Tools – The Dawn of Science and Technology
278
●
A Whole New World – Homo scientificus
281
●
Is Science Value-Free?
284
●
The Relationship of Science and Unbelief
285
●
Science as Method
288
●
Science is the Way to Transcendence
290
●
Science should Reflect Religion
295
●
Invention and Technology
300
●
Branches of Science
301
●
Physics
302
●
Astronomy – Cosmology
305
●
Astrobiology – We are not Alone!
307
●
Life Science – Biology
314
●
Welcome to Chemistry
316
●
Mathematical Science – Math is a Means to an End
319
●
Human Science – Sociology
319
●
Geology – Geospatial Technologies
321
●
Ecology – Darwinian Natural Selection
325
●
Medical Science – Human Genome
330
●
Future Sciences
333
●
Future Inventions
334
●
Nanotechnology
336
●
Future Drug Design
338
●
Future Stem Cells
340
●
Adult Stem Cells
342
●
Types of Adult Stem Cells
343
●
Cloning – Embryonic Stem Cells
345
●
Future Prospects and Safety Issues
347
●
Future Top Ten Technologies
349
●
Science in India
362
●
Pope John Paul II on Science
365
●
Bibliography
366
Chapter V – Engine Number Three – Language, Culture and Art
Role of Language, Culture and Art in Human Evolution
●
What is a Language? – Search for our Mother Tongue
371
●
Loom of Language
373
●
Homo loquens
377
●
Notable Works in Literature
382
●
Evolution of Culture
383
●
Emotional Omega Point – Neocortex
389
●
Cultural Evolution of Humankind
394
●
Cultural Socialization of Homo sapiens
397
●
Life Becomes Culture
402
●
Survival of the Past – Culture Permeates Survival
404
●
Aryan and Dravidian Cultures
406
●
Future Culture of Humanity
413
●
Social and Cultural Adaptations in the Future
416
●
Daydreaming About the Future Culture
418
●
Earth Culture Permeates Space Culture
423
●
Art and Architecture of the World
426
●
The Aurignacian (35,000 – 30,000 Years ago)
429
●
The Gravettian (30,000 – 22,000 Years ago)
430
●
The Solutrean (22,000 to 18,000 Years ago)
432
●
The Magdalenian (18,000 to 10,000 Years ago)
433
●
Egyptian Art
436
●
Indian Art
440
●
Renaissance Art and Architecture (1300-1500)
446
●
Seven Man-Made Ancient Wonders of the World
451
●
Seven Man-Made Wonders of the New World
457
●
Silk Road: Proto-Globalization of Language, Culture and Art
463
●
Endangered Ethnosphere
465
●
Bibliography
467
Chapter VI – The Precariousness of Human Existence
●
Not Yet “Human!” but “Reptilian!” – Brood of Vipers (Mt 23:33) 470
●
The Classification of Two Organisms
471
●
Shrinking of Human Brain – An Eerie Contrast
476
●
Extinction and the Evolution of Humankind
480
●
Why do Taxa go Extinct?
481
●
Not all Human Fossils are our Ancestors
483
●
The Case of Paranthropus – Big Brother Cain
484
●
A Sibling Species: Neanderthals – Little Brother Abel
486
●
And Then There Was One
488
●
Did We Kill the Neanderthals? – Replay of Cain and Abel
488
●
Culture and Sixth Mass Extinction
490
●
Present Evil Age
494
●
Human – An Endangered Species
495
●
Religious Wars – Humanity’s War for Gods
497
●
No Race – Biological Diversity Yes!
499
●
Race – A Discredited Concept in Biology
501
●
Race and Biological Diversity
502
●
Explaining Skin Color
505
●
Homo sapiens into Human Being
506
●
Globalization – Humanity’s Latest Virus
507
●
Humanity in Peril – Pressure on Water and Soil
530
●
Human – A New Canary in the Coalmine
533
●
Nature and Ecology – Climate Change
542
●
Popes and Catholic Church
544
●
Disappointing Copenhagen Summit 2009
545
●
Food Supply in Future – Humanity’s Hunger
546
●
Food Crisis
549
●
Colonies in Space – Rendez Vous with Extra Terrestrials
550
●
Humanity Underground with Ants
551
●
Human Resiliency – A Major Test
553
●
The Kingdom of Man – Nature’s Insurgent Son
562
●
Bibliography
563
Chapter VII – The Eternal Battle Between Sons of Light and
Sons of Darkness - Humanity at its Best and at its Worst
●
Good Seed and the Weeds – Presence of Good and Evil
●
Eternal Triumph Over Evil in “The Lord of the Rings”
570
●
Zoroaster – Forces of Good and Forces of Evil
573
●
Eternal Battle Between Sons of Light and Sons of Darkness
577
●
Humanity at its Best – The Sons of Light
581
●
Dalai Lama: Man at the Top – Homo sentiens or religious
582
Charles Darwin: Man with Grit –
Homo magnificus or scientificus
585
Wangarai Maathai: The Tree Lady – Homo saliens
587
●
●
567
●
Fr. Andreas Pathy: Son of Beatitudes – Homo illuminans
591
●
Mohandoss Karamchand Gandhi: Bapuji – Homo novus
599
●
Mother Theresa: Mother of All – Homo angelicus
602
●
Jesus of Nazareth – Imago Dei
605
●
Humanity at its Worst – The Sons of Darkness
608
●
Sati in India – Humanity Out of Balance
609
●
Colonialism – Humanity’s Downfall
614
●
Slavery – Humanity in Exile
619
●
World War I – Deep Scar on Humanity
621
●
World War II – Deep Hole on Humanity
624
●
Auschwitz-Birkenau – Humanity’s Fall from Grace
631
●
Birkenau (Auschwitz II)
634
●
The Eugenics – Humanity’s Alienation
637
●
Sri Lanka – Humanity Ignored
638
●
Rwanda – Humanity Bleeding
643
●
Human Fetus in Restaurants – Cannibals are Back!
645
●
Global Warming and Climate Change – Humanity’s Mortal Sin 647
●
Troubled Humanity – Impotency of Religions and Politics
648
●
Forgiveness for Papal Sins Down Through the Ages
655
●
Buck up Buckaroo … We’re Gonna be Alright
659
●
Finally …
659
●
Bibliography
661
Index
663
The Beginning
“The Lord God formed man out of the clay of the ground and blew into his
nostrils the breath of life, and so man became a living being” (Gen. 2:7). The
author of Genesis expresses in his poetic form that God created man
from the earth. For centuries this text was interpreted as immediate
creation by God of man from inorganic matter. Certain other texts affirmed
that the first woman was created immediately by God from Adam: “So the
Lord God cast a deep sleep on the man, and while he was sleep, he took out
one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh” (Gen. 2:21).
Have you ever wondered what an intriguing twists and turns in human
evolution we might discover, if we go back in our evolutionary biology?
This book is mainly on anthropological evolution. I am not at all very
much concerned on evolutionary theory. Where did it all begin, or how
was it all possible? A world teeming with human life needs a beginning.
To understand where we are now demands that we know something of
where we began, as we struggle to discover where we are all going. The
origin of the human race has fascinated more than its share of thinkers.
Science assumes that man is the latest product of a timeless machine,
which is called—natural selection. Evolution has been with contemporary
man for so long that it is taken for granted. Things develop and change;
thus it has always been and so it will continue. The twentieth century has
not only accepted biological evolution, but looks to find evolution in every
aspect of human life. Even theologians speak freely today of the development
or evolution of doctrine, words carefully avoided until very recently.
Sociology, psychology, and even politics and economics have their
evolutionary theories. It is no great surprise to live with biological
evolution. We are the end result of over a billion years of evolutionary
tinkering, and our genes carry the seams and spot-welds that reveal the
story. On the other hand religions teach that man is the highest and latest
creation of God, who fashioned him after his own—image and likeness,
so, man becomes God’s clone, and therefore man is placed at the top of
all creation. Christian anthropology must take its response to the question
of human origins and must respect the responses of other sciences.
Twentieth century man has also learned of the possibility that there
was natural force in the origin of mankind. Human life, as is true for all
matter, has evolved according to its own intrinsic principles. There is no
appreciable difference between the origin of animal forms from lower
species and the origin of mankind from a highly developed simian form.
Apes to Angels - Man Reaches his Omega Point
As must be evident, behind such a system there is more of a world outlook
than the mere facts of science. One extreme is to trace everything as it is
back to God; the other is to deny any influence of God. Christian thinkers
often try to steer the middle course between the two extremes and hold that
there is a real connection between man and the animal world, but there is a
distinction as well. A creative power of God is postulated with regard to the
origin of mankind. How this action is conceived is another question. The
question of interest in this study is not the evolutionary theory but
anthropological evolution. How can theology explain the origin of man?
Traditionally the explanation of human origin centered on what might be
called an anthropological fixism: all forms of life, each species was directly
created as was man. This is the theory based upon a fundamentalist
interpretation of Genesis 1-2. The main theory that opposes the evolution
theory on the explanation of how species emerged (phylogenesis) is
fixism. Fixism is about the diversity of life on earth that affirms that the
current existent species were identical to species of the past and came
out already adapted to the environment without undergoing changes.
The religious version of fixism is called creationism. Many different forms
of creationism are found in the mythology of various religions. Modernized
religious interpreters teach creationism as a metaphorical wisdom and
not as opposed to evolutionism. Anthropological fixism is that man has
created by God, not by evolution.
Fixism opposes evolutionism since evolutionism is the idea that
current species emerged from gradual transformations suffered by
ancestral and extinct species. Evolutionism is the theory that asserts that
life forms have been changing with time. Lamarckism and Darwinism are
forms of evolutionism. Furthermore it is possible to make evolution
compatible with creationism by considering that God in His perfection
would not create a world so full of imperfections and sufferings like our
world. One can maintain the creationist belief thinking that the world
God created is another much better world or at least not the one that we
see while admitting the imperfection of life that we see has emerged by
evolution. Evolution is the theory that holds that living species that are
true species, and not just variations of the same species, can be reduced
to a common root from which others are derived through change and
mutation. Evolution is affirmed for all living things. All life came from
more primitive forms, back to the most primitive of all; all life came from
the sea and developed and changed and mutated until earth was
populated with the myriad species known today. The development was
XII
Let us make Man … The
A Story
of Man
Beginning
gradual and plotted, yielding to ever-greater organization and complexity
until at the pyramid of life stood Homo sapiens. From one man came all
races we now have on earth. This was accomplished through evolution.
When the theory of evolution first appeared in the middle of the
nineteenth century, many thought that such a thesis had to be denied by
believing Christians because of Genesis story from the Bible. In light of
interpretations of Genesis today, this opinion is no longer necessarily
maintained. The author of Genesis was not interested in presenting a
theory opposed to, or in favor of, evolution. What he wanted to do was to
teach something about the meaning of human life and used the ideas of
his own time to express his thoughts. Scientific affirmations about the
origin of the world or the origin of the human race are matters for science
and not for faith. Whether man was created from organic or inorganic
matter, whether he arose monogenistically or polygenistically are
questions for science and not for the Bible.
Evolution in scripture, its presence or absence, is an open question to
which scripture can make no response. The author of Genesis, however,
as expressing the faith of a people, does make some affirmations that are
germane to the question today. The text states that man arose from the
earth. All of human life is somehow determined by its origin which is
from the earth. Clear limits of man’s existence are presented. No person
can live as if he had no relationship to the earth; all that a man is, even on
the most profound of human levels, is somehow affected by his earthly
origin. The bodily life, the emotional and psychological life, and even the
spiritual life that is man is limited and influenced by the world of which
he is a part and to which he is inextricably tied. Man is earthly and the
author of Genesis is most emphatic about this earthliness. Although earthly,
man has a special relationship to God. Other creatures receive their blessing
but man alone is created in the image of God (Gen. 1:27). Man is different
from all other creatures and this distinction precedes even his free
decision. Man is constituted in creation with a special possibility with
God; man can enter into a dialogue that is never able to be overlooked
and is present even when man chooses to deny this offer of dialogue
(Gen. 3:8). Man is from the earth, but has more than earthly possibilities.
The text of Genesis, unlike much of the Old Testament, placed woman on
an equal level with man; she too is created by God and has a special
relationship to God. She is created, in poetic form, from the rib of the
man. Far from manifesting a subservient role, this enhances man’s need
for woman. The rib is closest to the heart and man will never find his heart
unless he finds someone whom he can love. There is a moral union
XIII
established between man and woman; together they are the image of
God and will be so in actuality only when they are united by a union of
love. The “helper” of Genesis 2:18 is not a servant; she is a companion
who is like man and whom man needs for his own sake. The
complementarity of male and female is summed up in the closing verses
of chapter 2 in Genesis. In summary it can be said that the first chapter of
Genesis should be used to interpret the second chapter, and not vice
versa. The possibility of evolution is outside the ambit of scriptural
consideration.
Modern humans first evolved about 150,000 years ago, somewhere
in sub-Saharan Africa. That was one small step for man but a giant leap for
mankind—from hominoids to Homo sapiens, such as Cro-Magnon and
Neanderthals. And what happened to them? Cro-Magnon became modern
Europeans and Neanderthals were to be pushed one side, an extinct
human species that did not contribute to modern populations, no culture,
no genes, nothing. Ever since their extraordinary robust bones were
discovered in the Neander Valley near Dusseldorf in 1856, debate has
ranged, and raged over the place of Neanderthals in human history. Before
we work our way into the folds of this complex story, we need to step
back and view the big picture. We are concerned here with the origin of
modern people, the final emergence of humanity. Ultimately, and most
poignantly, it concerns the evolution of the human mind, and with it the
sense of esthetics, the sense of morality, the sense of invention, and the
sense of wonder about our place in the universe of things. The relative
brain size in humans is three times that of the average monkeys or apes.
Human evolution was a lengthy process of change by which people
originated from apelike ancestors. Scientific evidence shows that the
physical and behavioral traits shared by all people evolved over a period
of at least 6 million years. We know that Homo sapiens is not the final word
in primate evolution, but few have yet grasped that we are on the cusp of
profound biological change, poised to transcend our current form and
character on a journey to destinations of new imagination. At first glance,
the very notion that we might become more than “human” seems
preposterous. After all, we are still biologically identical in virtually every
respect to our cave-dwelling ancestors. But this lack of change is
deceptive.
Millions of years of human evolution are most often recounted as a
series of changes in the skeletons, artifacts, and big, flashy, attentiongrabbing behaviors of our ancestors. But the most profound, indeed the
XIV
A Story
of Man
Beginning
most stirring transformations in the evolutionary history of Homo sapiens
involve what does not fossilize and what is only sometimes made tangible:
belongingness. Belongingness is mattering to someone who matters to
you. It’s about getting positive feelings from our relationships. It’s what
you and I work to maintain or what we wish for with family and friends,
and perhaps also with colleagues or people in our community; for some
of us, it extends to animals as well (other animals, for we humans are first
and foremost animals). Relating emotionally to others shapes the very
quality of our lives. Belongingness, then, is a useful shorthand term for
the undeniable reality that humans of all ages, in all societies, thrive in
relation to others. That humans crave emotional connection is obvious in
some respects. Most of us marry and live in families, configured either as
parents, or single-parents living with children or, more commonly
worldwide, as multiple generations living together in extended family
groups. We do things, both spiritual and secular, and by choice as well as
necessity, in groups of relatives, friends, and associates. We write great
literature and make great art based on the deepest emotions for those
we love, or pine for, or grieve for. How did humans go from craving
belongingness to relating in profound and deep ways to God, gods, or
spirits? How did an engagement with the sacred that is wholly unique to
humans emerge from a desire for belongingness that is common to
monkeys, apes, extinct human ancestors, and humans of today? These
seem to me the most vital questions, and they will act as my touchstone
as I weave thick strands of information together into an evolutionary
account of the prehistory of belongingness. For four months, at work in
zoos and research centers and in the African bush, I have observed, filmed,
and interpreted the behavior of monkeys and apes.
The social and emotional behavior of these close relatives of ours
never fails to fascinate in its own right. In long-term study of particular
social groups, any keen observer comes to recognize bitter rivalries, deep
friendships, and enduring family ties—and becomes convinced that the
animals, too, recognize them and act accordingly. Like most
anthropologists, however, I have been motivated ultimately by the wish
to understand better the behavior of my own species. Coupling my own
research with analysis of the behavior of our humanlike extinct ancestors
in Africa, Asia, and Europe—as studied by other scholars—has allowed
me to grasp something about just how we humans evolved. I am especially
fascinated with the evolutionary history of empathy; of meaning-making;
of rule-following; of imagination; and of consciousness. In what ways do
XV
monkeys and apes today express behaviors related to these aspects of
emotional and cognitive life? How can we best seek evidence of these
in our extinct ancestors? Can we uncover traces of our emotional
prehistory in the remains, both physical and cultural, of the Neanderthals
and related groups? If so, how do these traces speak to us across the
millennia about the development of religion? These questions emerge
from my own experience as an observer of primates, a writer, and a student
of others’ anthropological research— and indeed from my long-standing
tendency to be attracted to the “big questions” of biological anthropology.
Yet no book that purports to explain something meaningful about religion
can spring entirely from a single discipline. Though biological
anthropology is the most appropriate field in which to ground our inquiry,
it’s necessary to adopt a broad perspective.
Never before have we had the power to manipulate human genetics
to alter our biology in meaningful, predictable ways. Bioethicists and
scientists alike worry about the consequences of coming genetic
technologies, but few have thought through the larger implications of
the wave of new developments arriving in reproduction biology. Today
“in vitro” fertilization is responsible for fewer than 3 percent of births in
the world; embryo selection numbers only in the hundred cases; cloning
and human genetic modification still lie ahead. But give these emerging
technologies a decade and they will be the cutting edge of human
biological change. These developments will write a new page in the
history of life, allowing us to seize control of our evolutionary future. Our
coming ability to choose our children’s genes will have immense social
impact and raise difficult ethical dilemmas. Biological enhancement will
lead us into unexplored realms, eventually challenging our basic ideas
about what it means to be human. Some imagine we will see the perils,
come to our senses, and turn away from such possibilities. But when we
imagine Prometheus stealing fire from the gods, we are not incredulous
or shocked by his act. It is too characteristically human. To forgo the
powerful technologies that genomics and molecular biology are bringing
would be as out of character for humanity as it would be to use them
without concern for the dangers they pose. We will do neither. The
question is no longer whether we will manipulate embryos, but when,
where, and how? Such a vision of human continuity is reassuring. It lets us
imagine a future in which we feel at home. Space pods, holographic
telephones, laser pistols, and other amazing gadgets are enticing to many
of us, but pondering a time when humans no longer exist is another story,
XVI
A Story
of Man
Beginning
one far too alien and unappealing to arouse our dramatic sympathies.
We’ve seen too many apocalyptic images of nuclear, biological, and
environmental disaster to think that the path to human extinction could
be anything but horrific.
Our DNA carries, hidden in its string of four simple letters, a historical
document stretching back to the origin of life and the first self-replicating
molecules, through our amoebic ancestors, and down to the present day.
Every one of us is carrying his or her personal history book around inside
us—we simply need to learn how to read it. Human genome project has
enabled the scientists to decipher the hidden mysteries of our origin
and as a result they have created a large database. The genetic database
will become a storehouse of information about the environments of the
past, environments in which ancestors survived and passed on the genes
that helped them to do so. To the extent that present and future
environments resemble those of the past, this “genetic book of the dead”
will turn out to be a useful manual for survival in the present and future.
The repository of that information will, at any one moment, reside in
individual bodies, but in the longer term, where reproduction is sexual
and DNA is shuffled from body to body, the database of survival
instructions will be the gene pool of a species. Each individual’s genome,
in any one generation, will be a sample from the species database.
Different species will have different databases because of their different
ancestral worlds. The database in the gene pool of camels will encode
information about deserts and how to survive in them. The DNA in mole
gene pools will contain instructions and hints for survival in dark, moist
soil. The DNA in predator gene pools will increasingly contain information
about prey animals, their evasive tricks and how to outsmart them. The
DNA in all gene pools contains information about parasites and how to
resist their pernicious invasions.
We cannot hold ourselves apart from the biological heritage that has
shaped us. What we learn from fruit flies, mice, or even a cute Dorset ewe
named Dolly is relevant to us. No matter how much the scientists who
perform basic research in animal genetics and reproduction may
sometimes deny it, their work is a critical part of the control we will soon
have over our biology. Over the past hundred years, the trajectory of the
life sciences traces a clear shift from description to understanding to
manipulation. This too now changing, and in the first half of the twenty
first century, biological understanding will likely become less an end in
itself than a means to manipulate biology. In one century, we have moved
XVII
from observing to understanding to engineering. Many feel that science
is more of a threat than a blessing. Yet the road to our eventual
disappearance might be paved not by humanity’s failure but by its
success. Progressive self-transformation could change our descendants
into something sufficiently different from our present selves to not be
human in the sense we use the term now. Such an occurrence would
more aptly be termed as pseudo-extinction, since it would not end our
lineage. Unlike the saber-toothed tiger and other large mammals that left
no descendants when our ancestors drove them to extinction, Homo
sapiens would spawn its own successors by fast-forwarding its evolution.
Some disaster, of course, might derail our technological advance, or our
biology might prove too complex to rework. But our recent deciphering
of the human genome (the entirety of our genetic constitution) and our
massive push to unravel life’s workings suggest that modification of our
biology is far nearer to reality than the distant space travel we see in
science fiction movies. Moreover, we are unlikely to achieve the
technology to flit around the galaxy without being able to breach our
own biology as well. Human genome project is only a beginning. Well
before this new millennium’s close, we will almost certainly change
ourselves enough to become much more than simply human. In this
book, I will explore the nature and meaning of these coming changes,
place them within the larger context of our rapid progress in biology and
technology, and examine the social and ethical implications of the first
tentative steps we are now taking.
I myself a Catholic priest, and so I am rather unlikely, to conclude that
religion is outdated superstition. I have strong belief that science and
religion are a one coin with two sides. They can have a healthy relationship
between each other. When I was in elementary school I was taught in the
religion class that God made man on the 6th day. At the same time, in the
science class, which followed the religious class, I was taught that the
same man was made by evolution. I asked the nun, who taught us religion,
why the difference was? And the answer was that such questions would
lead a person to hell. The same confusion persisted all through middle
school, high school and college and I still ask the same questions. I am not
a professional scientist but an enthusiastic, even zealous, lover of science
and “overhearer” of scientific gossips. I have done my best to get the
science right. I have checked it in every case with experts, but the views
I express about the nature and limits of science are my own. I believe that
the questions with which this book deals are the greatest intellectual and
XVIII
A Story
of Man
Beginning
existential questions facing any thoughtful person in the modern scientific
age, whether such persons are religious or not. So, the main purpose of
the book is to convey the depth, difficulty, intellectual excitement, and
importance of these big questions. My hope is that it may also convey an
understanding of the nature of science and of religion. As such, it is a
brief record of some of the most impressive achievements of the human
mind and some of the deepest unresolved questions that continue to
confront all who agree with Plato that “the unexamined life is not worth
living.” Good scientists recognize that truths about the real world, however
distasteful, have to be faced.
In my parish life, I rediscovered my old flame science and it was still
blazing Bunsen burner blue. I took many science courses, even as I
continued to think of myself primarily a Catholic priest, and even as my
fellow priests wondered why I bothered with all the physics, calculus,
computers, astronomy, and paleontology. I love science, but I have also
learned and learned and not forgotten but have nevertheless been forced
to relearn just how un-integrated science is into the rest of human affairs,
how stubbornly apart from the world it remains, and how persistent is the
image of the rare nerd, the idea that an appreciation of science is
something to be outgrown by all but those with, oddly enough,
overgrown brains. In this book, I have asked some unfamiliar questions.
Why didn’t the Chinese ‘discover’ Europe or America? Why didn’t the
Arabs circumnavigate Africa and the world? Why did it take so long for
people to learn that the earth goes around the sun? Why did people
begin to believe that there are ‘species’ of plants and animals? Why were
the facts of prehistory and the discovery of the progress of civilization so
slow in coming? I have included the story of only a few crucial inventions:
human origins, religion, science, and art. I have not told the story of the
shaping of governments, the waging of wars, the rise and fall of empires.
I have chronicled paleoanthropology, biological anthropology, cultural
anthropology, physical anthropology, environmental anthropology,
forensic anthropology and medial anthropology. I’ve discussed about
some of the human achievements in the fields of architecture, painting,
sculpture, music, and literature, much as these have multiplied the delights
of human experience. My focus remains on mankind’s need to know: to
know what is out there! The plan of the book as a whole is chronological.
In detail it is a single scheme. Each of the seven chapters overlaps
chronologically with its predecessor as the story advances from antiquity
to the present.
XIX
First Chapter tells the story of humanity from the view point of
evolution: starting from mammals, starting from some 50 million years
ago, the dawn of humanity, till the 21 st century the dawn of cyborgs,
computers, nanotechnology and machines. Here the author points out
that one of the great emancipating results of genomics is to show that all
“racial’ and color differences are recent, superficial, and misleading, we
all have a single origin. The reader will understand that it may be too soon
to say that all the progress is positive or “upward”, but human development
is still under way. Second chapter deals with fiction and non-fiction alike,
the possible complex developments in human evolution in future,
eventually man reaching his omega point—the image of God—the
argument is based on religious beliefs, astrobiology, evolutionary biology,
space science and cultural anthropology. Consequently when man learns
who he is and what he can be, he is filled with wonder. Are we destined
to become gods? The chapter stresses that man should recognize the
high estate of his human nature and he should remember that he is made
in God’s image. The beauty of the evolution is that human beings, by
making the right choices with their own free will, can become like angels
and in the process get rid of evil from this world. Third chapter discusses
about the power and influence of one of the engines that drives human
evolution forward: religion, it’s positive and negative effects on humanity.
This chapter’s interesting discussion on history of religions point out that
people joining in a cult or a belonging to a religion doesn’t mean that
they found a true divinity, but, on the other hand, it’s just a ‘stop over’
before the quest could continue. Chapter four looks at the other engine
which is responsible for human development: science. It insists that
science has carried us to the gateway to the universe and it would be
absurd to insist that ancient religious beliefs should remain unchanged
when our whole view of the universe has changed radically. Chapter five
focuses on the third engine in human evolution, celebrating some of the
human achievements in history: language, culture and art. Here we learn
that human beings have the greatest degree of freedom and therefore
the greatest range of creative adaptability. Chapter six is on the
precariousness of humanity, systematically discussing the fragility of our
species, which is still vulnerable, standing at the mercy of evolution.
Here the author argues that we are not yet human, but reptilian! His
“reptilian traits,” express more of those characteristics associated with
the reptilian brain and so you have the reptilian bloodlines of castemaniacs, power-maniacs, and blood-thirsty-maniacs. Chapter seven
XX
A Story
of Man
Beginning
proudly identifies some of the best samples of our species and also
painfully admitting the dark side of our species. However the eternal
triumph of good over evil does comfort our species and gives us hope.
Our faith that ‘good will always triumph,’ is tested again and again in
history. This recurring theme strikes echo to our own world. All we have
to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us. A kind of optimism
runs through the seventh chapter.
Thanks to His Eminence Emmanuel Cardinal Wamala of Uganda, Bishop
Soundararaju SDB of Vellore, India, for his consistent support to my
creativity, Bishop Christopher Kakooza of Kampala, Uganda, and Bishop
Brian Finnigan of Brisbane, Australia. Thanks also to Fr. Augustine, Fr.
Frederick Swai, Fr. Boniphace Mchami at Don Bosco, Upanga in Dar-EsSalaam,Tanzania. Thanks to Fr. George Chalissery, Fr. Paul Nyaga, Fr.
Clement Mulenga and Br. Dephinus Felician at the Salesian seminary of
philosophy in Moshi, Tanzania. Thanks to Joseph Pulikkal (Provincial), Fr.
Giovanni Rolandin (V.Provincial), Fr. George Tharaniyil (Economer), Fr.
Mathew Puthumana (Rector), Fr. Dunstan Haule ( V. Rector), Fr.
Kizhakkinedath Santey, and other Salesian priests at Don Bosco Provincial
House in Nairobi, Kenya. Thanks to Fr. Arasu SDB and other Salesian priests
of Don Bosco in Kampala, Uganda. Thanks to Fr. John Samala SDB and
other Salesian priests of Don Bosco, in Addis-Ababa, Ethiopia. I thank Fr.
Inniah Mangarpu, Fr. S. J. Anthonysamy, Fr. Cruz Hieronymus, Fr. R.
Antonysamy, Fr. Raja SJ, Fr. Chinnadurai SJ, Fr. John Samala SDB, Fr. A.T.
James SDB, Fr. Lawrance Varam SDB, Fr. Chinnappa OMI, Fr. Augustine
Sellam SDB, Fr. M. Charles, Fr. M. Johnson, Fr. Christian, Fr. D. F. Bosco, Fr.
Paul Ring, Fr. James Flavin, Fr. Paul MacDonald, Fr. John J. Shea, Fr. Bill
Schmidt, Fr. Mario Origgo, Fr. Stephen Pillai, Fr. A.C. Savarimuthu, Fr. Roy
Lazar. Fr. Henry George, Fr. Joseph, Fr. Susai Regis, Fr. Gnana Jyothi, Fr.
Albin Justus, Fr. Jeyaseelan, Fr. Kulandesu, Fr. Berchamans SDB, Fr. Charles
SDB, Fr. Y. Arockiasamy, Fr. Martin, Fr. Arulsamy, Fr. Brian Smith, Fr. Brian
Flynn, Fr. Joemics, Fr. James Vincent, Fr. Wilson, Fr. Manohardoss, Fr. Samuel,
Fr. S. Lourdusamy, Fr. Joe Lourdusamy, Fr. Ian Wren, Fr. Ken Howell, Fr. D.
Maria Joseph, Fr. Chitrarasu SDB, Fr. Patrick Joji SDB, Fr. Arulraj Kasi SDB, Fr.
Sagayaraj Kasi SDB, Fr. Ernest Pathy SDB, Fr. Praveen Samala SDB, Fr.
Marianna Michael Samala, Fr. Luisiba Stephen, Fr. Arasu SDB, Mrs. Francine
Bell, Theresa Moses, May Brophy, Kevin Brophy and the Brophies of
Brockton, Tom Sheen, John and Lorraine Breithaupt, C. Chitra, Sivagami,
Lilly and George Madathill, Vahini, Vanitha, Kanimozhli, Juliana Jacintha,
Sathiaseelan, Sr. Baby Victoria, Sr. Veda, Sr. Fatima, Sr. Auxilia, Sr. Leonie, Sr.
XXI
Alphonse FMA, Sr. Margaret Pathy FMA, Sr. Amala FMA, Sr. May FMA, Sr.
Felix, Sr. Eugene FMA, Sr. Thaines SMSM, Sr. Eluru Rakkini, Maria und Johann
Mayr, Uli and Gottfriet, Fransciska, Maria and Christian Auer, Alois and
Heidi, Grossmutter. I thank Amaya Turner for the expert advice on
religions—labeling the third chapter in this book—”Role of Good Old
Pesky Religions in Human Evolution.” I thank in a special way to Fr. Joseph,
Sagayam Deva and Josephine for their dedication to ecology, for
publishing this book through their LTD Media Publication. My special
thanks to Mr. Aruldoss and Stella Mangarpu for printing and bringing my
work to a perfect completion. My special thanks to Mrs. Francine D. Bell
for correcting and editing my works as she usually does all my writings.
Last but not the least, I thank my mom Balamma Kasi and all my brothers
and their families for their understanding of my passion for writing. This
book was in part inspired—or should one say provoked—by my mother,
constantly reminding me of my primate origins, when ever I do some
fresh things. She thinks that I am still playful like monkeys of the savannas,
however, not serious enough to be included in a mechanized human
civilization. She thinks that I can still do much better than this, by stating
this, she unconsciously admitting the power of evolution, which could
transform me gradually, much more complex or higher state of being;
metamorphism from savanna ape to an ethereal angel! Thanks Mom! She
is fascinated with the idea that we discern God as the Point Omega
towards which the world’s evolution and the whole of human history are
tending. It’s the work of the Lord and we find it marvelous indeed!
Rayappa A. Kasi – Eco Warrior
A. Kattupadi Post
Vellore – 632 011
India
Visit My Website: www.planetschaser.com
Email: soundchaser@vsnl.com
Mobile: 09443537885
Published on 24.5.2011
Feast of Mary Help of Christians
Parish Feast of A. Kattupadi Parish
XXII
Foreword
“There is really developing above us another hominisation, a collective
one of the whole species, and it is quite natural to observe, parallel with the
socialization of humanity, the same psycho-biological properties rising
upwards on the earth that the individual step to reflection originally
produced … This second phase of hominisation is to be conceived of as the
‘spirit of the earth,’ the central element of the mind of a sentient planet. We
are faced with a harmonized collectivity of consciousness equivalent to a
sort of super-consciousness,” wrote Teilhard De Chardin in his book
“Phenomenon of man.”
“Though we are God’s sons and daughters, we do not realize it yet”
(Meister Eckhart).
Modern man’s advanced development began with the appearance
of Homo sapiens approximately 100,000 years ago, the first creatures
who, through their development of the tools of reason and language,
were capable of discerning understanding. The appearance of
intelligent man appears to have been as a result of the human species
developing specific capabilities: the ability to build and operate
machines; the ability to reason: think for oneself, search for and discover
evidence, test hypotheses, arrive at tentative conclusions, and gain
understanding. The word “understanding” symbolizes a definite
experience, an activity beyond inner intellectual theorizing or
imagining, just as a note on a score stands for a palpable musical tone.
Genuine understanding can be acquired only by actual participation in
the reality. In activity, in function, ideas and concepts become embodied
in reality. As we function in the external world, we remove ideas and
concepts from the category of symbols suggesting truth into the
category of things conducting truth. Early in humankind’s physical
evolution we began to store mental and social information: how to build
and use machines. This kind of knowledge has to be learned after birth,
it is not instinctual or innate—no hominid is born knowing how to build
any machine. With the development of language, this information could
be passed from one generation to the next. Beyond the capability of
building and using machines, the extraordinary power of invention was
the essential mutation which made a new type of psychosocial evolution
possible. Humans have evolved physically through the intelligent
development of our machine-building capabilities. A machine is a
constructed device which transforms one form of energy into another,
decreasing entropy. Tools, language, and political-economic systems are
examples of machines. Human social organizations are machines in which
the components are living beings. Machines have enhanced human
evolution by decreasing entropy in their concepts, actions, and
organizations, increasing the amount of useful energy at our disposal.
Evolution, of whatever kind and at whatever level, involves simpler
structures organizing into more complex structures: particles evolving
into atoms, atoms evolving into systems such as animals, plants, galaxies,
stars.
The last 10,000 years saw human populations undergo much more
rapid evolution due to larger populations, geographic isolation, and strong
cultural forces that created diversity that involves intelligence,
athleticism, personality, and perhaps even character. The planet earth
will have a life-span of roughly ten billion years. The presence of mankind
(Homo sapiens) on earth is very recent. The Bronze Age began about
5300 years ago. The Industrial Revolution began about 250 years ago.
When will we humans evolve into angels? Perhaps, it will be after 1 million
or two millions? No idea. For lack of anything else, let’s say 100,000 years
from now, placing us current humans midway between apes and angels.
In any evolutionary process, what evolves is complexity. Chemical
complexity evolved till some of it became indistinguishable from
biological complexity. Evolution of biological complexity is determined
by two main factors: natural selection, and self-organization. Darwin’s
discovery of our “apeness” is now a simple fact of zoological taxonomy
which provides a foundation for further speculation. Our quest now is to
understand the genetic basis for mind, belief, and personality. Genes
somehow build our brains and make us uniquely human, a form of ape
whose brains are in some respects qualitatively superior to those of all
other creatures. Buried beneath sublime poetry, music, or mathematical
cerebration is the older ape of our ancestry, but angels are now seen for
the fantastical fabrications they always were. We may turn out to be
automatons but the vast complexity of our brains will protect our egos.
We have ignorance and self-deception as means of escape from reality
anyway.
Prior to Homo sapiens, members of the Homo habilis and Homo erectus
strains had trained themselves in such skills as fire-making, hunting, shelterbuilding, and food gathering. But to them, human experience was merely
XXIV
Let us make Man … A Story of Man
Foreword
a series of events without long-term significance. With humankind’s
development of language and reason it became possible to pass down
one generation’s accumulated understanding to the next generation, to
create what we now call a culture. Homo sapiens’ evolution has been almost
entirely cultural, not biological. In fact, it appears that we are somewhat
degenerating biologically. The main process of bipedal primate mammal
(hominid) physical evolution has been the increasing ability to create
and use machines. The Homo sapiens species has carried the main trend
of machine development to its logical conclusion: we are becoming
increasingly dependent on machines. Homo sapiens populations have
evolved in a unique manner: through psychosocial adaptation, that is,
through constantly developing mental powers and organizational
systems. We have no evidence that any other animal group has ever
evolved in this same way. A number of astounding mutations have taken
place within the Homo sapiens species, physical, mental, and spiritual. The
primary physical mutation is the capability of invention. Mentally, the
outstanding mutational adaptation has been reasoning to the point of
understanding. The primary spiritual mutation is inspiration. From the
building blocks we find in apelike ancestors emerged the soulful need
to pray to gods, to praise God with hymns, to shake in terror before the
power of invisible spirits, to fear for one’s life at the hands of the unknown
or to feel bathed in all-enveloping love from the heavens. To express in
straightforward language the profound depth of this human emotional
connection to the sacred is a challenge. The inaccessibility to language
of the sacred experience mirrors what Martin Buber writes about when
he describes human relating with God: “it is wrapped in a cloud but reveals
itself, it lacks but creates language. We hear no You and yet we feel addressed;
we answer—creating, thinking, acting: with our being we speak the basic word,
unable to say You with our mouth.”
We’ve been “homo sapiens” for quite a long time. I don’t know about
others but I often wonder what’s next after this current stage of human
evolution. Scientists are fond of running the evolutionary clock backward,
using DNA analysis and the fossil record to figure out when our ancestors
stood erect and split off from the rest of the primate evolutionary tree.
But the clock is running forward as well. So where are humans headed?
Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins says it’s the question he’s most
often asked, and “a question that any prudent evolutionist will evade.”
But the question is being raised even more frequently as researchers
study our past and contemplate our future. Paleontologists say that
XXV
anatomically modern humans may have at one time shared the earth
with as many as three other closely related types—Neanderthals, Homo
erectus and the dwarf hominids whose remains were discovered in
Indonesia in 2009. Does evolutionary theory allow for circumstances in
which “spin-off ” human species could develop again? Some think the
rapid rise of genetic modification could be just such a circumstance.
Others believe we could blend ourselves with machines in
unprecedented ways—turning natural-born humans into an endangered
species. Human nature is not fully understood but its genetic foundation
is under intense analysis by armies of researchers either bent on pure
science or medical breakthroughs.
The neuroscientist Gerald Edelman, who sees the brain as a Darwinian
mechanism, has a model that will greatly enhance our understanding of
brain operation as it is verified by further research. Edelman believes
that robots will “ape” many human traits without ever becoming fully
human. Others, however, are not so sure! It would be supremely ironic if
the religious fear of ape ancestry was displaced by a greater fear of
robotic human nature. The historical fact of evolution is accepted by
professional biologists as well as scientists in general, but science
education has never succeeded in raising biological literacy to an
adequate level. The revolution western thought wrought by Darwin was
always accentuated by its antagonistic relations with religions. While
technological marvels capture the headlines, it was modern science that
gradually pushed religion out of its domain. Religion could not compete
with the scientific method of investigating nature, pure and simple.
Religion, often discomforted by scientific findings, must be given credit
for encouraging reason and exploration as science thrived in the twentieth
century. Cultural evolution long ago took over as man’s primary means of
progress on earth. Only the powers of the human mind could have
accomplished such a transformation. Once Homo sapiens underwent a
major change in the brain’s prefrontal cortex, they developed art,
language, and finally, 7,000 years ago, agriculture and real communities.
Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece and India were early civilizations with the
beginnings of law, technology, food production, and even trade. As
science and technology accelerated in Europe in the Middle Ages and
beyond, the cumulative effects produced greater acceleration. We are
indeed cultural animals who must come to terms with the truth about our
ape ancestry and primitive leftover attitudes, tendencies, and instincts.
The whole truth lies somewhere between “nothing but ape” and the
XXVI
Foreword
pure product of political and social force. Both forces, genetic and
environmental, are always at work because they are built to interact,
producing a symphony of modular capacities and higher-order
consciousness found nowhere else in nature, except perhaps in
rudimentary form in our very nearest relatives.
There is a “type one” of Homo sapiens. He is sub-human. The present
rulers are literally sub-human; they do not have the intellectual and moral
capabilities to lead society in a productive and positive direction. In
condemning such people Jesus exclaimed, “Snakes! Sons of vipers! How
will you escape the judgment of hell?” (Mathew: 23-33). They are currently
self-destructing, as the outcome of their political-economic-social
depravity catches up with them. The word “sub-human” has been used
by various groups as a mindless-term of rejection: the Nazis depicting
other European peoples as sub-human; some cultures referring to women
as sub-humans; rich societies depicting poor as sub-human, and so on. I
am using the term only in a descriptive manner, referring to certain people
as sub-human who have lost the ability to think critically, who possess no
desire to understand the truth, and who have no compassion for their
fellow-humans. Since those and other qualities are essential in true
humans, their absence from these people renders them sub-human. There
is a “type two” of Homo sapiens that possesses supra-human capabilities
and guides human destiny, rescuing humankind from destruction at the
hand of demonic rulers. Had it not been for these extraordinary humans—
such as Hermes, Pythagoras, Plato, Jesus, Boethius, Rumi, Patrick Henry,
Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Martin Luther King—the
human race would long ago have disappeared into oblivion. Each
evolving system incorporates all the properties and information of its
subsystems plus certain new properties and information of its own design.
The new properties and information are epiphenomena of the new higherorder self-creating system—autopoiesis. Each system is composed of a
central organizing nucleus with simpler interdependent subsystems in
the periphery, for example, cells and their nuclei, humans and the brain,
human societies and their central governments. Autopoiesis literally
means “self-production” (from the Greek: auto for self and poiesis for
creation or production) and expresses a fundamental complementarity
between structure and function. More precisely, the term refers to the
dynamics of non-equilibrium structures; that is, organized states
(sometimes also called dissipative structures) that remain stable for long
periods of time despite matter and energy continually flowing through
XXVII
them. Each time a new level of self-creation (autopoiesis) evolves, a new
dimension of complexity occurs: nucleons becoming atoms, atoms
becoming molecules, molecules becoming bacteria, bacteria becoming
nucleated cells, cells becoming metazoa, metazoa becoming humans,
humans becoming supra-humans or angels. “You have made him little less
than the angels, and crowned him with glory and honor” (Psalm 8:5-6).
There is now present an entirely new factor in human evolution which
began about ten thousand years ago. Whereas up to that time, human
evolution had been primarily powered by unconscious physical and
social stimuli, it is now possible for human evolution to be advanced
through conscious effort. The next step in human evolution would be the
advent of supra-human or angel. Though ordinary humans are rapidly
losing the ability to understand reality, a small contemporary group is
accessing supernormal knowledge through portals into higher
consciousness. They are making knowledge available about what is
actually going on in the world—beyond what the demonic cabal’s media
lies (evil people-brood of vipers) say is going on. And, of critical
importance, they are preserving higher knowledge in books and web
sites which will be available when conditions have degenerated to the
point where a rudely awakened mass of people will suddenly say: “How
can we get out of this intolerable situation? What knowledge do we need
to re-build a sane and progressive world?” Mankind’s spiritual—and
physical—evolution has been guided by seers such as Hermes, Plato,
Zoroaster, Buddha, Mahavir, Jesus, Mohammad, Rumi, Francis of Assisi,
and Shakespeare. Therefore, we must distinguish two different strains or
“types” within the human species: ordinary human beings within a culture;
and human beings who have undergone a spiritual transformation through
initiation into a higher consciousness and are harbingers of the evolutionary
supra-human. Supra-humans (Clement of Alexandria referred to them as
“ True Gnostics”) are not just superficially different in degree from
ordinary humans; they are a different “type” altogether. They represent a
distinct higher level of being within the Man (Homo) genus and the
Homo sapiens species—the new evolutionary strain that is now emerging.
They are distinguished from ordinary Homo sapiens by their: achievement
of a higher understanding; experience of a spiritual transformation; ability
to live in both the terrestrial and the spiritual worlds simultaneously.
The new supra-humans compose a race of adventurers, dwelling
invisibly among mankind, who have evolved to the point of being able
to deliberately and actively return to the divine Fount of Reality. They
XXVIII
Foreword
have attained Being, union with the One, and teach these mysteries to
authentic seekers. Because of this, they have a unique importance for the
evolution of the human race in revealing humankind’s full potential and
how this potential can be realized. Outwardly, these supra-humans appear
the same as ordinary human beings; the difference is internal and spiritual
and can only be discerned by members of the same “type.” Suprahumans are confluently active in a higher consciousness, co-conscious
with one another in a super-human intelligence. In each era of human
histor y, adepts in the higher consciousness have made exoteric
knowledge available to the people in general to enhance their
evolutionary development. This knowledge has served as the basis for
periodic social advancement, as in Pythagoras’ cultural center at Croton,
Plato’s Academy in Athens, the Neo-Platonic center in Alexandria, and
the seventeenth and eighteenth century Enlightenment in Europe and
America. To specific students, they have taught the esoteric knowledge
of spiritual and cultural regeneration. This new “type” of person has
discovered that humans are—in their essence—expressions of the One
Higher Being or Imago Dei—the Image of God. The being of humankind
is a manifestation of the Universal Being and our evolution is the unfolding
and realization of this Everlasting Spirit. Since all humans “live and move
and have our being” in this Eternal Mind, we evolve by gaining a
progressively creative and discerning understanding of this Universal
Spirit.
From one man comes all races we now have on earth. This was
accomplished through evolution. Creation in the first place was
accomplished through God. The study of evolution has uncovered
invaluable information about many aspects of human behavior and culture,
from the physiology of our bodies and brains to the development of
hunting, technology, and social groups. But an understanding of the
intangibles of human experience, especially religion, lags far behind.
Attempts to discover the source of religiosity through genetic analysis
and neuroscience have so far yielded intriguing but incomplete insights.
“Apes to Angels – Man Reaches His Omega Point” represents an exciting
breakthrough. Drawing on his own extensive investigations in Africa into
the behavior of our closest primate relatives and the most up-to-date
research in archaeology, anthropology, and biology, Rayappa A. Kasi offers
a comprehensive, holistic view of how and why man should transform
into angels. Rayappa focuses on how the Great Apes, our human ancestors,
and modern humans relate to one another socially and emotionally, and
XXIX
he traces the growing complexities of communication throughout the
course of evolution. He shows that, with increased brain capacity, the
scope and nature of socio-emotional ties began with one-to-one
relationships and expanded to group relationships (families and
communities) and then to connections with long-dead ancestors, animal
spirits, and “higher beings.” His incisive, highly readable narrative takes
readers from the earliest common relative of humans and apes (more
than 6 million years ago), through the Neanderthal period and the Stone
Age, to the dawn of religion in early human societies. “Apes to Angels –
Man Reaches His Omega Point” explores one of the greatest mysteries in
human history—the question of whether humankind is innately religious.
Are we destined to become gods? Rayappa A. Kasi provides evidence
that will have a tremendous impact on current debates about evolution,
creationism, and intelligent design. “Wake up man, and recognize the high
estate of your human nature. Remember you are made in God’s image…”
Pope St. Leo the Great (461).
Dr. S.J. Antonysamy
Diocese of Chennai
XXX
Prologue
Before you begin to read, the author warns you not to be intimidated
or confused with the strange scientific words used in this book. Before
you make any attempt to go further, the author recommends first to read
the Prologue which definitely sets everything in motion. Don’t get
disoriented by the difficult words, obviously, you would get used to it, as
you go forward. After all, the origin of these words is—our human essence.
So, all set, get ready: This is the story of you and me!
Way back in the 19th century Charles Darwin, author of ‘The Origin of
Specie,’ postulated that the African continent was ‘formerly inhabited by
extinct apes allied to the gorilla and chimpanzee’. He declared that these
animals were ‘man’s nearest allies’ and, writing of the origin of man,
concluded that it was ‘more probable that our early progenitors lived in
the African continent than elsewhere. The famous English naturalist did
not say that people were descended directly from living apes; his
carefully reasoned theory merely inspired the hypothesis that since apes
and humans are so similar, anatomically, they probably has descended
from a common ancestor. But hypothesis were confused with fact by
commentators of the day, and Darwin suffered much abuse as a result.
Meanwhile, scientists looked for ways to test the hypothesis. If it was true
that all living things had evolved from earlier forms, as Darwin proposed,
then proof of that fact should be found among the fossilized remains of
early man, for instance. They would link modern man to his ancestral
form and thus reveal the intermediate stages of human evolution. So
began the search for the ‘Missing Link’. The study of fossil man has been
restricted to a slowly accumulating collection of specimens; mainly skulls.
By the end of the 19th century only five had been discovered. Another
25 years passed before a dozen were known, and even today the
significant specimens; those which have contributed new information
to the study of human evolution; could all be accommodated in a suitcase.
The fossils have come from Europe, the Far East, and Africa; varying in
age more than three million years, but representing a very small fraction
of mankind’s potential ancestry during that time.
The fossilized skullcap and bones from Germany were the first serious
candidates for consideration as a missing link between ape and man.
The remains were found in a cave high on the precipitous face of the
Neanderthal Valley near Dusseldorf in 1856 by workers quarrying for
limestone, and the publication of Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species” in
1859 cast them into the evolutionary limelight. Neanderthal Man (as he
was later dubbed) displayed just the mixture of features guaranteed to
inspire controversy. Fossils from Belgium and Gibraltor in due course
confirmed the existence of the Neanderthal Man throughout Europe in
early times, but did nothing to clarify his status as a missing link. In the
early 1900s, after many skeletons were found, the French paleontologist
Marcellin Boule, determined the Neanderthals could not fully extend
their legs, walked stopped over, and had his head thrust forward. This
notion would be the popular image for about fifty years. In 1957
researchers re-examined the skeleton Boule had examined and
concluded that Neanderthals walked upright and that the stopped
posture suggested by Boule’s specimen was due to a case of arthritis.
More evidence from various digs has shown that Neanderthals wielded
simple tools, wore body ornaments, had religious rites and ceremoniously
buried their dead. Today they are classified as totally human: Homo
sapiens, but it seems that they became extinct when the modern race of
humans moved into Europe from Africa within the last 100,000 years.
In 1887 a Dutch doctor of medicine, Eugene Dubois, sailed for Java
with express intention of finding the ‘missing link’. In four years of
excavation Dubois and his team unearthed more than 12,000 fossils; but
just five specimens of early man: one jaw fragment, two teeth, one skullcap,
and one thighbone. This meager evidence was enough to persuade
Dubois that he had discovered the missing link. He named it
Pithecanthropus erectus (upright ape-man) but it was impossible to form
from these scanty remains a complete and satisfactory reconstruction,
and when similar, more complete and satisfactory reconstruction, and
when similar, more complex specimens were found near Peking in the
1920s it was immediately clear that Dubois’ missing link was more manlike than intermediate. The Java and Peking materials were named Homo
erectus (upright man), and additional discoveries were soon unearthed
in Africa. The collection as a whole dates from 1.6 million to 300,000
years ago, making Homo erectus the longest surviving, as well as the
most widespread, of all the fossil hominids. Fifty years after the search for
the missing link had begun. Neanderthal man and Dubois’ Java man were
still the only candidates and questions were being asked. How did ape
and man diverge from their common ancestor? Which of the three major
features that distinguish man from ape evolved first; the upright stance,
the large brain, or the differences in dentition? Here was fertile ground
for hypothesis and argument which eventually resulted in two opposing
XXXII
Prologue
points of view. Both camps were confounded by the fossil remains of
Piltdown Man, discovered in Piltdown, England, which were introduced to
science in 1912.
Piltdown Man had a skull and braincase of modern human proportions
and a jaw which could have belonged to a modern ape: the perfect
missing link. Too perfect, it was eventually discovered. Piltdown Man was
a fake; a modern human skull and a modern ape jaw knocked about
enough to look like ancient fossil. But 40 years passed before the
specimen was proven false and its “proof ” that the large brain was an
early feature of human evolution tended to dominate the study of fossil
man during that time. This was largely responsible for the rejection of
genuine missing link from South Africa described by Raymond Dart in
1925. The specimen consisted of a partially complete skull with the brain
size of an ape and the jaw of a human. Dart named it Australopithecus
africanus (the southern ape of Africa), and pointed to features which, he
said, indicated the ancestral status of his find. In particular, the hole in the
base of the skull through which the spinal cord joins the brain was set
well forward, he pointed out, indicating that the head had been erect at
the top of the spine, as in humans. This implied that the creature had
walked upright on two feet, and if Australopithecus was accepted as a
human ancestor then the upright stance must have preceded
enlargement of the brain. Over a period of 25 years, Robert Broom, a
retired Scots medical doctor, accumulated evidence which eventually
established the validity of Dart’s claim. Australopithecine fossils from the
sites which Broom excavated in the Transvaal included skulls with small
brain-cases and skeletal remains of a creature that had quite definitely
walked upright. It was now certain that the upright stance had preceded
the large brain in the course of human evolution; and Australopithecus
could be assigned missing link status.
In 1959 in Tanganyika ( Tanzania), Louis and Mary Leakey found
australopithecine fossils at Olduvai Gorge in deposits which turned out
to be 1.7 million years old. Geologists working with the Leakeys dated
the Olduvai deposits by the newly refined potassium-argon method.
This ability to determine the absolute age of a specimen shifted the
emphasis of the search from the missing link to the earliest man. The
Leakeys disagreed with the belief that Australopithecus was an ancestor
of mankind (they advocated the primacy of the large brain). Louis Leakey
dubbed their specimen Zinjanthropus (East African Man; popularly known
as Nutcracker Man on account of its enormous teeth) and promoted it as
XXXIII
the oldest specimen. But the Zinj skull was quietly relegated to a less
prominent status when more human-like fossils of a similar age were
discovered at Olduvai some months later. These fossils consisted of skull
fragments, a lower jaw, and some hand bones. Leakey and his team
assigned them to a new species; Homo habilis, colloquially translated as
‘handy man’. The brain size of Homo habilis appeared to be relatively
large, and when a team led by Richard Leakey discovered a fossil of
similar configuration (the famous 1470 skull) in deposits in Northern Kenya
dated at 1.88 million years, it seemed that the oldest man must have had
a relatively large brain.
But Leak ey ’s prize was demoted by the spec tacular series of
discoveries made by The International Afar Research Expedition in
Ethiopia, at Hadar in the Afar region of the Awash Valley, in 1974. This was
the finding, by a team led by Donald Johanson of Chicago of the bones
of the oldest known hominid, i.e. erect-walking human ancestor. Believed
to be 3.2 million years old, these important remains were known to
scientists by the Hadar classification AL 288-1. They constitute well over
half the skeleton of a fully-grown female hominid. She became popularly
known as ‘Lucy’, so named after the Beatles’ song “Lucy in the Sky with
Diamonds” which was being played on the day of her discovery. Some
Ethiopians however call her Denkenesh. Paleoanthropologists prefer to
refer to her by the longer, but more scientific, name of Australopithecus
afarensis. The first of these words means Southern Ape, while the second
refers to the Afar area where she came to light. Lucy, when alive, stood
only three and a half feet high, and probably weighed only about 60
pounds. She is believed to have had a tiny brain, like an ape, but was of
special interest in that, like human beings, she walked erect. Her pelvis
and leg bones were likewise almost identical to those of modern humans.
Her V-shaped jaw again resembled almost identical to those of modern
human species and differed markedly from the box-like tooth formation
found on apes. She is classified as hominid because she reportedly walked
erect: like humans. Lucy’s discovery was of immense scientific importance,
above all because it seems to indicate that man began to walk erect before
evolving enlarged brains. This runs counter to the earlier widely held
supposition that it was because they had larger brains that the species
began to walk erect. The practice of walking erect was important in that
it gave human beings free hands which could be used to make-and usestone, or other, tools, the earliest perhaps being no more than branches
torn down from trees. Walking would also have been useful in enabling
hominids to carry their infants as well as supplies of food in their arms.
XXXIV
Prologue
Subsequent research in Ethiopia, carried out in the nearby Gona Valley,
south-west of Hadar, as well as the Omo Valley further south, has led to
the discovery of numerous stone tools, and fossils, thought to be around
2.5 million years old. Between 1996 and 1998 archaeologists Giday Worlde
Gabriel and his colleagues discovered another new species.
Australopithecus garhi, in the Afar region. Also around 2.5 million years
old. Although younger than Lucy, it appeared to have similarities with
Australopithecus afarensis and could be another link in the chain of human
ancestor. Lucy now is preserved in an Addis Ababa bank vault. An exact
plaster copy, however, is on permanent display in Ethiopia’s National
Museum, in Addis Ababa. This institution dedicated to Ethiopian/African
paleoanthropology. Since Lucy was discovered, finds from other parts of
Africa have led to claims of even older hominid remains, notably a skull six to
seven million years old from the Djurab Desert of Chad. Those who found
his skull in 2001 insist he is the oldest human ancestor, a small fellow (who
they named Toumai) who lived by an African lake some 7 million years
ago. Doubters have maintained that the skull belongs to an ancient
chimpanzee or a gorilla. More recent findings, however, include teeth
and jaw fragments unearthed in Toumai’s neighborhood. Together with a
reconstruction of his cracked skull, they support the idea that he was
more than ape.
XXXV
Chapter I
“Though we are God’s sons and daughters, we do not realize it yet”
(Meister Eckhart).
This is the most remarkable and most outstanding geological time in
the history of the earth, perhaps in the history of the universe. Bible refers
this time as “the zenith of creation.” It’s truly the time of humanity—the
jewel in the crown of God’s creation is man and woman. Only humans can
unlock the complexity of this world in which we live, indeed only humans
can ask questions. Have you ever wondered what incredible stories you
might discover, if you could go back and spend time with your ancestors?
Not like here, to just a few generations ago, but through millennia—to
thousands of generations ago, to an ancestor who shared the world with
the Australopiths like, afarensis, boisei, habilis, erectus, and Neanderthals.1
Jump back 60,000 generations, and we’d meet one of the first people to
ever step foot outside Africa. A 100,000 generations, and meeting the
relatives would be even more intimidating than you could ever have
imagined. Well, that’s just what we’re going to do. Travel back through
time to meet the creatures who have become us and see how their lives led to
the amazing reality of ours. Our dead ancestors have left us a key to unlock
their past, with their fossil bones and relics as a guide, scientists can build
a picture of what it would be like to travel back in time. These tiny pieces
hold secrets, not only to how our ancestors died, but to how they lived?
From our closest cousins—the Neanderthals, to the first fierce Europeans,
from ancestors with the wit to survive in the jungles of Asia to the first
true families, who worked together in sun-baked Africa, we’re journeying
back in time, revealing with each step the mysterious ingredients that
makes us unique and meeting the first creatures—the earliest toolmakers,
and the heavyweight contenders who shaped our past.
How did humans evolve? Where did it all begin, or how was it all
possible? A world teeming with human life needs a beginning. To
understand where we are now demands that we know something of
where we began, as we struggle to discover where we are all going. In
the last few years, great progress has been made in understanding man’s
1
These are the names of the earlier human-like-species belonging to the genus Homo.
closest relatives—the primates; the monkeys and the apes. New fossils have
been found. Anatomical investigations have added to our knowledge of
chromosomes, skin and nervous system. Biochemical studies have clarified
the relationships of many forms of primates to each other and to man. The
understanding of the social life of monkeys and apes has given many
insights, into the background and the process of our own evolution. This
is not only has philosophic implications for the understanding of man but
practical applications in psychology and medicine. Perhaps the greatest
addition to our information has come in studies of behaviors of primates.
The Book of Proverbs from the Bible has great words of wisdom on human
evolution. “Thus says the wisdom of God: The Lord possessed me, the
beginning of his ways the forerunner of his prodigies of long ago; from of old
I was poured forth, at the first, before the earth. When there were no depths I
was brought forth, when there were no foundations or springs of water; before
the mountains were settled into place, before the hills, I was brought forth;
while as yet the earth and fields were not made, nor the first clods of the world.
When the Lord established the heavens I was there, when he marked out the
vault over the face of the deep; when he made firm the skies above, when he
fixed fast the foundations of the earth; when he set for the sea its limit, so that
the waters should not transgress his command; then was I beside him as his
craftsman, and I was his delight day by day, playing before him all the while,
playing on the surface of his earth; and I found delight in the human race”
(Proverbs 8:22-31).
Hominoids as Catarrhine Primates
Since humans and apes together make up the hominoids 2 humans are
also catarrhine anthropoids 3. The first Catarrhine primates evolved
between 60 million and 33 million years ago. Most primate fossils from
this period have been found in a region of northern Egypt known as Al
Fayyum (or the Fayum). A primate group known as—Propliopithecus,
one lineage of which is sometimes called Aegyptopithecus, had primitive
catarrhine features, that is, it had many of the basic features that Old Ways
monkeys, apes, and humans share today. Thus, Propliopithecus may also
be considered an ancestor or a close relative of an ancestor of humans.
These are the members of the ape family and their ancestors including gibbon,
orangutan, gorilla, chimpanzee and bonobo and Homo or human.
2
3
These are the primates with closely-set nostrils, that have nostrils set close together
and facing downward. Old World monkeys and apes belong to the infraorder of
catarrhine anthropoids.
2
Hominoids evolved during the Miocene Epoch (24 million to 5 million
years ago). Among the oldest known hominoids is a group of primates known
by its genus name, Proconsul, earliest apes, found in Rusinga Island in Lake
Victoria, Kenya by Mary Leakey on 1st October 1948. It was in many fragments
which had to be carefully pieced together. It was taken to the Natural
History Museum in London and only returned to Kenya in 1981. At first, it
was thought to be a missing link between apes and humans, but later it
was realized that it was an early ape, a possible shared ancestor for modern
apes and man. It is believed that this animal weighed about 9 kg and
lived in the trees, eating fruits. Unlike monkeys, it did not have a tail and
had more flexible limbs. The species Proconsul heseloni 4 lived in the trees
of dense forests in eastern Africa about 18 million years ago. An agile
climber, it had the flexible backbone and narrow chest characteristic of
monkeys, but also a wide range of movement in the hip and thumb, traits
characteristic of apes and humans. Scientists, do not all agree about the
appropriate classification of hominoids. They group the living hominoids
into either two or three families—Hylobatidae which consists of the small
or so-called lesser apes of Southeast Asia, commonly known as—gibbons
and siamangs, Hominidae which include humans and, according to some
scientists, the great apes. For those who include only humans among the
Hominidae, all of the great apes, including the orangutans of Southeast
Asia, belong to the family of Pongidae.
It might, at first glance, appear surprising that the study of monkeys
and apes should be considered as a subject worthy of a name of all its
own: Primatology. Here is a science that has within the short span of a few
decades suddenly emerged as not only one of the most fascinating of all
sciences but also as one of the most important; a discipline which has
drawn to itself not only zoologists and biologists but also psychologists,
physiologists, biochemists and what is perhaps most interesting of all,
anthropologists in increasing numbers. Why we ask, should any
anthropologist devote his career to it? Anthropology is, after all, the study
of man; and anthropologists, pursuing man’s own origins, would seem to
have enough work on their hands without taking on the lower members
of his order. The answer is that zoologists for many years have classified
man with the primates because of their close anatomical similarity. Recent
developments in the field of biochemistry support this classification by
4
It is the oldest known fossil of hominoids, exhibited in the Nairobi Museum. Early in
their evolution, the large apes underwent several radiations, periods when new and
diverse species branched off from common ancestors, and one of them was proconsul.
3
showing that close relationships of cells and blood also exist between
man and all the other primates. Primate, meaning first, is the name Linnaeus
chose for the animal order containing monkeys, apes and man. From a
shrew like progenitor in the Paleocene, these creatures eventually came
to dominate the animal kingdom. How the primates evolved, starting
from the prosimians and ascending toward man, it is a story which is now
being revealed in ever and fascinating detail. The 13 living primate families
fall neatly into four main groups: A. The New World Monkeys; B. The Old
World Monkeys C. Prosimians, D. Apes and Man.
Old World and New World Monkeys
New world monkeys are Marmosets like pygmy marmoset, is the world’s smallest
monkey and capuchin-like monkeys, which include capuchin monkeys,
douroucoulis, spider monkeys, wooly monkeys and howler monkeys. They are all
found only in Central and South America. Old World monkeys include guenons,
mangabeys, colobus monkeys, macaques, langurs, and baboons. The scientific
classification of primates reflects evolutionary relationships among individual
species and groups of species. Stepsirhine (meaning ‘turned-nosed’) primates, of
which the living representatives include lemurs, lorises, and other groups of species
all commonly known as prosimians. The earliest monkeys and apes evolved from
ancestral haplorhine (meaning ‘simple-nosed’) primates, of which the most
primitive living representative is the tarsier.
Now, thanks to a tremendous recent upsurge in studies of monkeys
and apes in their natural environment, it is becoming clear that in their
social behavior too, they stand much closer to man than anyone had
suspected. Many live in highly organized and frequently hierarchical
groups, some ruled by a single, all-powerful leader, others by a select
group whose members pass down their power to their offspring. In a
group of monkeys, some will be good friends, others dedicated enemies;
some will be collaborators, others rivals; some will be popular, others
despised. Infant monkeys, as they grow up, must learn a code of behavior,
much as a human child has to do; and all the members of a group are
linked together by an elaborate system of communication which
embraces both sounds and gestures and goes far beyond what is
necessary for mere brute survival. The comparison with human behavior,
of course, is not to be pushed too far. Yet in their daily routine and, in
many respects, their relationship with their fellows, there are surprising
resemblances between man and the nonhuman primates.
4
Sixty million years ago primates have already living on trees. From
this time on, the story of primate evolution is very largely the story of
how successive species improved their ability to move about in the
trees. “Grasp” was the key because grasp meant security. It enabled primates
to climb more safely along delicate branches and so expand their range
for food. It reduced the risk of falling, and because of the superior
purchase it provided, grasp permitted them to grow much larger than
they could have done had their weight been supported by claws.
Anatomically, however, men and monkeys are very different animals.
Monkeys, being quadrupeds, retain many of the characteristics of
primitive four legged mammals. Their trunk is long, narrow and deep,
and their limbs are hung from it in a very special way which restricts their
movements largely to using their arms and legs in a backward and forward
plane, as in walking or running. The general proportions of a monkey’s
trunk are much like those of a dog, and like a dog, a monkey tends to
keep its arms and legs parallel. Even when stretching, it will reach out
forward, as a dog does when it awakens from sleep, rises and yawns and
stretches out its legs. And in the trees, monkeys for the most part move
the way a four-legged animal moves, walking or running along the top of
a branch.
With apes, it is quite different, as it is with man. Unfortunately, the fossil
record which would enable us to trace the emergence of the apes is still
hopelessly incomplete. We do not know either when or where distinctively
apelike animals first began to diverge from monkey stock. The best that
can be said is that they came into existence some 25 to 30 million years
ago, somewhere in the forest that stretched at that time, uninterrupted
by water barriers, from Africa across Asia to the East Indies. There are
today four main genera of apes, divided into two families. One family includes
the African gorilla, bonobo and chimpanzee and their Asiatic relative, the
orangutan; the other family is that of the Asiatic gibbons, and siamangs. All
are quite different anatomically from any monkeys, and the most obvious
distinction is that they are built for a different form of locomotion, with
short, wide, shallow trunks that do not bend and long, free-swinging arms
which enable them to reach out in all directions in the trees, grasping
and swinging their bodies from the branches instead of running on top
of them, monkey-fashion, on all fours.
It is tempting to think of apes as being bipedal animals which are on
the verge of standing erect and moving on their legs alone, but this is an
oversimplification. Essentially they are still as four-legged as monkeys,
5
but on the ground they move in a wide variety of ways, all of them quits
different from the way monkeys do. The chimpanzee and the gorilla use
their arms in walking, but they walk on the knuckles of their hands. The
orangutan on the ground is simply awkward; it is almost never found
there. The gibbon goes on two legs but balances with its arms held high.
Only man is an efficient biped, and the structure of his pelvis and legs,
which makes possible his characteristically erect posture and bipedal
locomotion, is very different from the apes, almost as different from the
waist down as the ape’s body from the waist up is different from the
monkeys. Exactly how or why the apes came to move about by swinging
from their arms is debatable, but the most satisfactory explanation is that
natural selection favored arm-swinging as a means of obtaining food. Many
branches high in the forest canopy are too delicate to bear even the
weight of an average-sized monkey moving along them on all fours, let
alone that of a big ape, but if the weight can be divided by hanging from
several branches with two feet and one hand, then a lot of hitherto
unreachable food becomes available. And this is the way apes do feed,
in perfect comfort. With exception of the gibbon, all apes are much bigger
than any tree-dwelling monkey. Obviously, the ability to swing from their
arms provided them with an opportunity for growth, but why was this
opportunity exploited? What advantage did the apes win by growing
bigger?
There was, of course, a competitive advantage: the advantage that
any big animal has over a smaller one when it comes to eat or be eaten.
But there is also the fact that size carries with it an advantage in the form
of extended life span. Big animals tend to live longer because their rate
of metabolism is slower than that of small animals; their internal organs
simply do not have to work so hard, and therefore do not wear out so fast.
Any useful change begets more change along the line of development
concerned: it is a basic rule of evolutionary dynamics. The practice of
arm-swinging in the apes prompted a series of further changes which
altered the primate anatomy, providing on the one hand the potential for
tool-using man and on the other the extreme specializations of the modern
anthropoid apes. In order to swing more effectively from their arms, the
apes acquired a whole new complex of characteristics in their shoulders,
their elbows and their wrists which combined to make their arm
movements much more flexible. Apes can swing their arms out in a wide
circle from their shoulders, forward, sideways, backward and up. With
their more flexible elbows they can straighten out their arms, and their
6
wrists are much more mobile than a monkey’s, more so, in fact, than a
man’s. An ape can hang from a branch by one hand and rotate its body
completely around, thanks to the flexibility of its arm and wrist joints.
For a variety of reasons, certainly including ignorance and possibly
conceit, man has always had a tendency to consider his own qualities as
being unique. In the course of so doing, people have tended to lump
apes together with monkeys as animals that resemble each other, both,
physically and mentally, much more closely than either resembles man.
So far as their intelligence is concerned, this assumption may be accurate
enough. But as any close observer of apes and monkeys knows, man
stands physically much closer to an ape than an ape does to a monkey. It is
important to remember that this similarity is primarily physical. Men and
apes are very different, and man is no more the descendant of a modern
ape than one grandchild of a common grandparent is the descendant of
another grandchild. Still, just as a grandchild is linked to its grandfather
by an intermediate parent, so man must somehow be linked to an apelike
ancestor. We shall be discussing this point in more detail in this chapter.
For the moment, it is enough to say that man, as he finally evolved, was
the beneficiary of millions of years of evolutionary progress spurred by
the exacting demands of arboreal life. Although he long ago went his
own separate evolutionary way, he has good reason to see in the
anthropoid apes of today a vision of what his own ancestors may once
have been (more on apes towards the end of this chapter).
Hominids5 - A Leap Toward Man
Some 15 to 20 million years ago, several different species of apes
inhabited the huge forest which then stretched, unbroken by any major
water barriers, from the west coast of Africa to what are now the islands of
the East Indies. Then, in a slow but decisive manner, the climate changed.
The forests of the Middle East dried out and were transformed into desert,
and the great population of apes was split into two groups whose
descendants still survive as the chimpanzee and the gorilla of Africa, and
the orangutan and the gibbon of East Asia. But in between, over an area
which covers several million square miles, no apes survive at all. What
happened to them? Where did they go? These questions are of vital interest
to us because it may well be that their descendants were the ancestors of man.
Unfortunately, the early stages of man’s evolutionary progress along his
5
These are the erect walking members of Homo genus, which led to modern humans.
7
own individual line remain a total mystery, and several million years must
have elapsed before they reached the stage where we can, with some
confidence, take up their story. We do know that between four million
and one-and-a-half million years ago at least two varieties of small apelike
men had come into existence in South and East Africa, and no doubt,
across much of southern Asia also. These intermediate creatures stood
about five feet tall, one weighing about 24 and the other about 54
kilograms. Their brains were not quite as big as that of a large male
gorilla. But, unlike any ape, they could run, though they probably could
not yet stride, in an upright position with their bodies balanced on their
hind legs.
Anthropologists theorize that modern human beings evolved from
earlier mammal ancestors. Mammals are a class of animals capable of
breast-feeding their offspring. Science has had to leave the definition
rather flexibly because we do not yet know exactly when hominids first
appeared. However, it is safe to say that a hominid is an erect-walking
primate. That is, it is either an extinct ancestor to man, relative to man, or
a true man. All human beings are hominids, but not all hominids are human
beings. As we’ve seen earlier one can picture human evolution as starting
with a primitive apelike type that gradually, over a long period of time,
began to be less and less apelike and more manlike. There was no abrupt
crossover from ape to human, but probably a rather fuzzy time of inbetween types that would be difficult to classify either way. We have no
fossils yet that tell us what went on during that in-between time. Therefore,
the handiest way of separating the newer types from their ape ancestors
is to lump together all those that stood up on their hind legs. That group of
men and near-men is called hominids.
There have been number of other species of Homo who were not so
smart ancestors now extinct. Homo sapiens began to emerge a hundred
thousand, perhaps two or three hundred thousand years ago, depending
on how one regards Neanderthal Man. He was another Homo. Some think
he was the same species as ours. Others think he was an ancestor. There
are a few who consider him a kind of cousin. That matter is unsettled
because many of the best Neanderthal fossils were collected in Europe
before anybody knew how to excavate site properly or get good dates.
Consequently, we do not have exact ages for most of the Neanderthal
fossils in collections. I consider Neanderthal is of the same species with
sapiens, with ours. He was just little heavier-boned than people today,
more primitive in a few facial features. But he was a man. His brain was as
8
big as a modern man’s, but shaped in a slightly different way. Neanderthal
man had ancestors—human ones. Before him in time was a less advanced
type, Homo erectus. Before Homo erectus was a really primitive type,
Homo habilis. Before Homo habilis the human line may run out entirely.
The next stop in the past, back of Homo habilis, might be something of
Australopithecines like, afarensis and boisei, of which we’ll discuss in
length later in this chapter. All of these are hominids. They are all erect
walkers.
Heredity, Genetics and Human Physical Characteristics
We are diverged branch terminals of the same tree. Sometimes
divergence occurs simultaneously among a number of populations of a
single species. In this process, known as “adaptive radiation”, members of
the species quickly disperse to take advantage of the many different
types of habitat niches, that is, the different ways of obtaining food and
shelter in their environment. Such specialization ultimately results in a
number of genetically distinct but similar-looking species. Genetic
evidence points to an evolutionary divergence between the lineages of
great apes and humans on the African continent between 10 and perhaps
6 million years ago. The theory of evolution and the survival of the fittest
makes one basic assumption; that parents are able to transmit
characteristics to their offspring. Without that process, evolution could
not take place. We call this process heredity. You can easily see heredity at
work in families. Biological members of the same family usually share
family likenesses. For example, some family members might have the
same hair or eye color or a similar body shape. All human beings are
immediately recognizable as human beings. Yet, except for identical twins,
no two human beings look alike, even within the same family. This is true
of other species, too. Think of how many different breeds of dogs there
are. How do likenesses and differences come about within families? Why
do some people have fair skin and others black or brown skin? Why are
some people short and some tall? The answer is to be found in their
genetic makeup.
The systematic study of genetics began with the research of the
Austrian monk, Gregor Mendel. 6 For eight years he carried out controlled
breeding experiments on the common pea plant. In a paper published in
1886, Mendel outlined his results and put forward his basic concept, now
6
Gregor Mendel (1822-1886), whose experimental work became the basis of modern
hereditary theory. His observations also led him to coin two terms still used in presentday genetics: dominance, for a trait that shows up in an offspring; and recessive ness,
for a trait masked by a dominant gene.
9
referred to as the—Mendelian Theory. In simple terms, the theory states
that genes are transmitted to offspring from the parent. These genes
occur in pairs and are, as later research has shown, coding devices that
control the development of characteristics. Although Mendel’s work was
done with plants, his laws are applicable to humans and animals as well.
Human physical characteristics, then—are transmitted by heredity
through the genes, which govern all aspects of physical development.
In humans these include sex, hair color, height, skin color, body build, and
so on. Except for identical twins, each individual’s makeup is unique.
Research indicated that the chances of a brother and sister having
identical genes, is 1 in 70 trillion. Since human being is the focus of our
attention, perhaps we should define what it is to be human being. How
would you describe what it is to be “human?” Being human has three
dimensions; the physical, the social, and the spiritual. Let us examine some
of the human physical characteristics that make us different from the rest
of the animal world. We should also consider how we came into beings.
Once we know how we differ from the animal world, we can start to look
at the great variations among human beings and what roles heredity and
environment play in developing these differences. There are four
important, human physical Characteristics:
1. Brain - The human brain is the largest and one of the most complex
in the animal world. Not only does it control all our physical functions,
but it can store a large amount of data. We use it to reason and calculate,
our brain is more powerful and at times faster than any computer yet
built.
2. Upright Posture - We share the ability to walk upright with the large
apes. However, only human beings use the upright posture permanently.
It has some obvious advantages; the most important is that is that our
hands are free to manipulate objects.
3. Opposable Thumb – This characteristic we share with the monkeys
and the apes. The opposable thumb is a versatile device. With it we can
grasp and manipulate tools, something that very few other species can
do.
4. Vocal Apparatus – Humans have the most developed vocal
equipment of all species. Without it, we could not have developed
language. Without language we could not communicate with others, or
retain our history and traditions, or transmit knowledge. Language provides
us with the capacity for abstract thought. None of these four characteristics
by itself would make human beings so spectacularly different from the
rest of the animal world. We share single characteristics with other species,
sea otters use stones as tools to break open hard shells of shellfish, apes
10
have been observed using twigs to catch a meal of termites, even whales
appear to communicate by a system of sounds that we have not yet
understood. But, taken together, these four characteristics have a powerful
impact.
Sahelanthropus tchadensis – (7 to 6 million years old)
Paleontologists recognize at least eight species of early australopiths
(humanlike). These include the three earliest established species, which
belong to the genera: Sahelanthropus, Orrorin, and Ardipithecus, a species
of the genus Kenyanthropus, and four species of the genus
Australopithecus (southern ape) 7. The oldest known australopith species is
Sahelanthropus tchadensis. Fossils of this species were first discovered in
2001 in northern Chad, Central Africa, by a research team led by French
paleontologist Michel Brunet. The researchers estimated the fossils to be
between 7 million and 6 million years old. One of the fossils is cracked
yet nearly complete cranium that shows a combination of apelike and
humanlike features. Apelike features include small brain size, an elongated
brain case, and areas of bone where strong neck muscles would have
attached. Humanlike features include small, flat canine teeth, a short
middle part of the face, and a massive brow ridge (a bony, protruding
ridge above the eyes) similar to that of later human fossils. The opening
where the spinal cord attaches to the brain is tucked under the brain
case, which suggests that the head was balanced on an upright body. It
is not certain that Sahelanthropus walked bipedal, however, because
bones from the rest of its skeleton have yet to be discovered. Nonetheless,
its age and humanlike characteristics suggest that the human and African
ape lineage had divided from one another by at least 6 million years ago.
In addition to reigning debate about human origins, the discovery of
Sahelanthropus in Chad significantly expanded the known geographic
range of the earliest humans. The Great Rift Valley and South Africa, from
which almost all other discoveries of early human fossils came, are
apparently not the only regions of the continent that preserve the oldest
clues of human evolution.
The Great Rift Valley
The Great Rift Valley faulting cut the Olduvai beds in many places. In 1913 the
German geologist Hans Reck numbered the faults from one to five, from east to
west. Faulting, which began as much as 1.5 million years ago, has continued
intermittently almost to the present. The faulting that took place 30,000 to 100,000
years ago caused subsidence between the first fault and the foot of Ngorongoro
Crater to form the Olbalbal Depression. This depression accelerated erosion,
allowing streams to cut Olduvai Gorge to its present depths of 45 to 90 meters.
7
The four species of genus Australopithecus are anamensis, afarensis, africanus and garhi.
11
Orrorin tugenensis – (6 million Years old)
Orrorin tugenensis lived about 6 million years ago and he is named
“the Millennium Man.” This species was discovered in 2000 by a research
team led by French paleontologist Brigitte Senut and French geologist
Martin Pickford in the Tugen Hills region of Central Kenya. The researchers
found more than a dozen early human fossils dating between 6.2 million
and 6 million years old. Among the finds were two thighbones that possess
a groove indicative of an upright stance and bipedal walking. Although
the finds are still being studied, the researchers consider these thighbones
to be the oldest evidence of habitual two-legged walking. Fossilized
bones from other parts of the skeleton show apelike features, including
long, curved finger bones useful for strong grasping and movement
through trees, and apelike canine and premolar teeth. Because of this
distinctive combination of ape and human traits, the researchers gave a
new genus and species name to these fossils, “Orrorin tugenensis”, which
in the local language means “original man in the Tugen region.” The age of
these fossils suggests that the divergence of humans from our common
ancestor with chimpanzees occurred before 6 million years ago.
Ardipithecus ramidus – (5.8 to 4.4 million years old)
In 1994 an Ethiopian member of a research team led by American
paleoanthropologist Tim White discovered human fossils estimated to
be about 4.4 million years old. White and his colleagues gave their
discovery the name “Ardipithecus ramidus” . “Ramid” means “root” in the
Afar language of Ethiopia and refers to the closeness of this new species to
the roots of humanity. At the time of this discover y, the genus
Australopithecus was scientifically well established. White devised the
genus name “Ardipithecus” to distinguish this new species from other
Australopiths8 because its fossils had a very ancient combination of apelike
and humanlike traits. More recent finds indicate that this species may
have lived as 5.8 million to 5.2 million years ago. It has been suggested,
however, that these older fossils may represent a related species called
Ardipithecus kadabba. The teeth of Ardipithecus ramidus had a thin outer
layer of enamel, a trait also seen in the African apes but not in other
Australopiths species or older ape fossil. This trait suggests a fairly close
relationship with an ancestor of the African apes. In addition the skeleton
shows strong similarities to that of a chimpanzee but has slightly reduced
canine teeth and adaptations for bipedalism.
8
Australopiths or also known as Australopithecines, the earliest humanlike primates,
which represent the group from which the ancestors of modern humans emerged.
12
The Australopithecines
The biggest difference between the australopithecines and the
chimpanzees-like creatures is that they are believed to have descended
from that of the australopithecines that could walk on two legs. The
australopithecines also displayed a slight increase in cranial capacity,
although they retained a relatively prognathic, or protruding, face. It has
recently become apparent that there were also various postcranial
adaptations within the group. Some, for example, were more adapted to
climbing, while others were more suited to a terrestrial lifestyle. Between
4 and 1 million years ago, several different species of ape-men inhabited
the African landscape. There appears to have been significant regional
variation among these species, but two dominant forms have been
identified:
1. The gracile australopithecine, defined by their relatively ‘light’ masticating
apparatus (their teeth and chewing muscles), an older species that
disappeared from the fossil record between 2 and 2.5 million years ago.
2. The robust australopithecines (sometimes placed in the genus
Paranthropus), who survived until about 1 million years ago before
becoming extinct. They are labeled ‘robust’ not because of their body
size, but because of the tremendous size of their jaws and teeth.
We owe our knowledge of the Australopithecines, as these primitive,
small-brained ape men were called, to the patient archaeological
researches of three remarkable men, in 1924, Raymond A. Dart, professor
of anatomy at the University of Witwaterstrand, perceived in a skull that
had been dug up not far from Johannesburg the traces of a very early
type of hominid: part ape, part man. During the next few years, Dart’s
perception was confirmed by the discovery of more Australopithecine
fossils, unearthed elsewhere in South Africa by a Scottish physician, Robert
Broom, who was excited at Dart’s initial find, had come out to join in the
search. Meanwhile, an English pre-historian, Louis Leakey, had also started
to hunt for fossils of early men, at Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania . For nearly 30
Olduvai Gorge
Olduvai Gorge is one of the most important archaeological sites on earth. The
geological strata exposed in the gorge reveals a remarkable record of animal and
human evolution from about two million until fifteen thousand years ago. Among
the significant finds from Olduvai are the range of stone tool types, the thousands
of animal fossils, both extinct and extant species, and the fossil bones of hominid
(pre Homo sapiens) and early Homo sapiens. The hominid fossils show the evolution
of humankind over a two-million-year time span and provide a sense of our recent
emergence in the world as modern humans.
13
years, Leakey and his wife Mary kept up the hunt, digging up the fossils
of ancient animals and equally ancient tools. Then, in 1959, Leakey made
a great find. He unearthed the fossil remains of a creature very similar to
Dart’s Australopithecus, and he also made two other discoveries of
enormous significance. Close to the fossils, there were tools made out of
pebbles, chipped to give them a sharp cutting edge, and there were
also the bones of small animals, of rats and mice and small pigs and
antelope. These finds provided the basis for the first coherent and
satisfactory explanation of how man came to evolve out of his apelike
ancestors. This evolutionary process has been started in considerable
detail by Professor Sherwood Washburn of the University of California,
and much of what follows has been based upon his series of papers on
the subject.
Washburn’s explanation of how early man came into existence is not
merely novel; it also contradicts number of assumptions that had
previously gone largely unquestioned. Long before Leakey unearthed
his Australopithecine fossils in 1959, most anthropologists were agreed
that the only animals that could properly be considered human were the
ones that able to make and to use tools. But how had man acquired the
ability to use tools? The fashionable answer was that he had first developed
a unique large, complex and efficient brain. Possessed of this extremely
serviceable brain, he was able to manipulate tools. And he could do so
more easily because somehow he had also become a bipedal creature
who could stand up and move about on two legs with his arms and hands
left free. Actually as Leakey’s finds demonstrated the traditional explanation
of human evolution had placed with great precision right behind the
cart. Although the Australopithecines had brains little bigger than those
of a chimpanzee, they had already learned to fashion and to use simple
tools, probably for hunting.
Laetoli Footprints in the Ashes of Time
It happened some 3,600,000 (3.6 million) years ago, at the onset of a
rainy season. The East African landscape then, much as it does now, in a
series of savannas punctuated by wind-sculptured acacia trees. To the
east the volcano now called Sadiman heaved restlessly spewing ash
over the flat expanse known as Laetoli. The creatures that inhabited the
region, and they were plentiful, showed no panic. They continued to
drift on their random errands. Several times Sadiman blanketed the plain
with a thin layer of ash. Tentative showers, precursors of the heavy seasonal
rains, moistened the ash. Each layer hardened, preserving in remarkable
14
detail the footprints left by the ancient fauna. The Laetoli Beds, as
geologists designate the oldest deposits at Laetoli, captured a frozen
moment of time from the remote past: a pageant unique in prehistory. The
Laetoli hominid footprints were discovered during a paleontological
expedition led by Dr. Mary Leakey in 1974. The footprints dated at 3.6
million years are in the Northwest Tanzania, some 30 km south of famous
site of Olduvai Gorge. The track way consists of some 70 footprints in two
parallel traits about 20 meters long, preserved in hardened volcanic ash.
It also consists of animal prints. The track way was excavated by Dr. Mary
Leakey in 1978–1979. Still, what Mary Leakey and her team have
discovered to date at Laetoli will cause yet another upheaval in the study
of human origins. For in the gray, petrified ash of the beds, among the
spoor of the extinct predecessors of today’s elephants, hyenas, hares,
they’ve found hominid footprints that are remarkably similar to those of
modern man. Prints that in their opinion could only, have been left by an
ancestor of man. Prints that were laid down an incredible 3,600,000 years
ago! Following excavations and study, the footprints were documented
photographically, molded for casting and reburied for protection.
The footprints have immense scientific value particularly for
understanding human evolution. Significantly the earliest known stone
tools are about 2.6 million years old. These stone tools were probably
made a million years after the Laetoli footprints. The Laetoli footprints
were therefore fully bipedal well before the advent of tool making. The
footprints are the most ancient traces yet found of humanity’s ancestors.
Of course, the Laetoli hominid resembles the gracile Australopithecus,
but Mary Leakey believes that, so far back in time, all the hominids shared
certain characteristics. However, the simple evidence of the footprints,
so very much like our own, indicates that the Laetoli hominid stands in
the direct line of man’s ancestry. They also provide irrefutable evidence
that australopiths regularly walked bipedal. Discovery of the hominid
footprints at Laetoli was a most remarkable event in the history of human
paleontology. It is unlikely that any similar evidence will be found in the
foreseeable future, if ever again. This singular discovery plays a crucial
role in understanding the evolution of our own species for two quite
different reasons. The first is symbolic. These imprints represent the earliest
preserved direct traces of our ancestors upon the earth’s surface, some
3.6 million years ago. There is scarcely anything so evocative, as the
Laetoli trail, symbolizing humanity’s long and wondrous journey. The
footprints bear witness to a defining moment in the evolution of
humankind and speak to us directly and without ambiguity across
thousands of millennia.
15
The second fundamental reason why the prints are so important has to
do with bipedality, our unique adaptation among primates to walk upright.
Unlike fossil bones of the foot, the prints show the soft-tissue form of the
foot and the gait of early hominids. They provide direct information about
the arch of the foot, the position of the big toe in relation to the axis of the
foot, the form and depth of impression of the heel, and the stride length
and footfall pattern made by hominids more than 3.6 million years ago.
The Laetoli hominid footprints are fossilized imprints of our earliest
ancestors preserved in volcanic tuff. They are millions of years old, yet
are almost indistinguishable from a human footprint. Footprints are
evocative. They show where others have gone before. When Neil
Armstrong trod on the surface of the moon, images of his footprints were
instantly recognized as symbols of humankind’s first tentative steps into
the cosmos. The Laetoli footprints demonstrate one and for all, that at
least 3,600,000 years ago what believed to be the man’s direct ancestor
walked fully upright with bipedal has striding gait.
Australopithecus “The Southern Ape”
The oldest known hominid or hominin remains are classified as
belonging to the genus “Australopithecus” and are found only in Africa. It
is thought that Australopithecus anamensis lived around 4.2 million years
old. Australopithecus afarensis lived from about 4 to 3 million years ago
and it was also an ancestral to the rather similar species Australopithecus
africanus. And also two other species Paranthropus robustus and
Paranthropus boisei, also had appeared by 2 million years ago, but both
are regarded as evolutionary dead ends. It is not clear whether A. afarensis
or A. africanus gave rise to Homo habilis. Homo habilis appeared at least
2 million years ago and differed from Australopithecus in being slightly
taller, having a larger cranial capacity, having more humanlike teeth, and
having hands capable of the precise manipulation of objects. Homo
habilis was distinguished above all by the ability to deliberately shape
stones for use as tools, a capability that gives the species its name (Handy
Man) and implies sufficient intelligence to justify its taxonomic
designation as the first species of the genus Homo. Homo habilis inhabited
sub-Saharan Africa until about 1.5 million years ago. A new, taller, and
more human species, Homo erectus, appears to have evolved from and
supplanted H. habilis. This species lived from almost 2 million to 250,000
years ago and gradually migrated into Asia and probably into parts of
Europe. Homo erectus had a larger brain capacity, but also retained a
number of apelike traits, including thick skull bones, jutting brow ridges,
a receding forehead, and a projecting jaw. Nonetheless, H. erectus was
recognizably human and apparently was the first hominid to master fire
and to live in caves.
16
Homo sapiens are thought to have first appeared about 400,000 years
ago, certainly in Africa and perhaps in parts of Asia as well. This features
of early-archaic H. sapiens more closely resembled those of H. erectus,
but late-archaic forms had such modern human features as a larger brain
capacity, a vertical forehead, rounded back part of the head, reduced
jaws and teeth, clearly defined chin, and a fully erect posture and gait.
Homo sapiens used hand axes and flake tools of increasingly greater
variety and specificity. The human populations called Neanderthals
classified either as a separate species (Homo neanderthalensis) or as a
subspecies (Homo sapiens neanderthalensis), inhabited Europe and the
Mediterranean lands from about 200,000 years ago until they disappeared
some 50,000 to 30,000 years ago. Anatomically modern humans appeared
in Africa and possibly in Asia perhaps 100,000 years ago and eventually
arrived in Europe. Whether they supplanted or absorbed Neanderthal
populations is not clear. Among these European peoples, the best known
are the Cro-Magnons. Their populations expanded rapidly throughout
Europe, and their level of material culture became increasingly more
complex and sophisticated. The emergence of fully modern humans in
other parts of the world is less understood, though it seems to have
occurred 30,000-15,000 years ago and involved various migrations and
the intermingling of different populations.
Australopithecus anamensis – (4.2 to 3.8 million years old)
The earliest of the australopithecines, this species is based on a
relatively small number of specimens, discovered by Meave Leakey’s
Kenya National Museum team in the Lake Turkana region of Kenya. A
large tibia (shin bone) indicates that this species was well adapted to
walking on two legs, while the parallel tooth rows visible in the jaws are
more ape-like, indicating a very primitive head compared to the hominids
listed below. This species looks like a good candidate as ancestor of all
later hominids. Towards the end of the Miocene Epoch, the shrinking
forests of Africa provided less habitable space for the apes, and they
started to become extinct, a trend that continues today. At the same
Miocene E p o c h
Miocene Epoch, is the first division of the Neogene period of the Cenozoic Era,
spanning a time interval from 23 to 5.3 million years ago. The fauna of the Miocene
included a number of mammals, among them the rhinoceros, camel, cat, and horse.
The mastodon made its appearance at this time, as did the raccoon and weasel.
During this epoch, large apes, related to the orangutan, lived in Asia and the
southern portion of Europe; these apes are the closest Miocene relatives of
humanlike apes, which first appeared during the Pliocene epoch.
17
time, the more terrestrial, faster breeding monkeys began to increase,
leading to the dominance of monkeys over apes in terms of numbers.
Ausralopithecus afarensis – (3.8 to 3 million years old)
We would travel back three and a half million years to Africa, to meet
a creature who began the journey from apes to us. It is known as
Australopithecus afarensis. This is our ancient ancestor from 300,000
generations ago. This species has a special role in our story, a story of you
and me. There is something that sets these creatures apart from any ape
that’s gone before them. They can stand and walk on two legs. Aside from
walking upright, there’s nothing very remarkable about these creatures
at all. They are as subject to the laws of nature as everything else. What on
earth happened to make an ape stand upright and walk on two legs? The
answer is, the world changed. Three and half million years ago, Africa was
covered with trees almost from edge to edge. It was the forest and what
happened to it, that holds the secret of why an ancient tree-swinging
ape was transformed into a two-footed afarensis. India is the cause. Yet the
catalyst for this change doesn’t come from trees, but beneath the sea’s
surface. Here thousands of miles away, the ocean floor is expanding. The
earth itself is on the move, at about the speed that fingernails grow. It’s
changing the face of the planet.
A vast chunk of the earth’s crust has been pushed to the north. One
day, we will know it as India. Deep underground, as it collides with Asia,
it creates a twisted mass of rock, the biggest mountain range on the
planet; the Himalayas. The mountains are having an extraordinary effect
on the world’s weather. They prompted some of the heaviest storms ever
seen; the monsoons. The rain strips the moisture from the air, so the air
currents that reach Africa are not wet but dry. The rainforests retreat.
Over the millions of years, a scattered landscape takes shape. And
something else has changed the scenery. A vast chasm, the Great Rift
Valley has ripped through one side of Africa. It altered the habitat still
further. Everything from beetles to apes has had to keep pace with this
phenomenal change. Our tree-swinging ancestors have evolved. Forced
to spend more time on the ground, they’ve become the upright; a walking
afarensis. But why use only two feet to get around on the ground? It’s
easy to think that being upright brings obvious advantages. An afarensis
can stand taller and see further, but that also means everything else can
see afarensis. Two legs have, in fact, made afarensis neither quicker nor
safer. So what is the advantage to afarensis of walking upright in this new
18
world? The truth is walking on two legs became a defining feature of our
lives for the most surprising of reasons: raising babies. In the natural world,
sex and raising babies is the key to a species surviving. So, anything that
gives you extra energy to do it better is like gold dust. And extra energy is
what walking upright has given afarensis. In this prehistoric world, walking
on two legs is simply more efficient than walking on four. The savings are
tiny, perhaps as little as the number of calories found in one packet of
biscuits a year. But even such a tiny amount makes a difference.
In 1974, in Ethiopia, American paleoanthropologist Donald C. Johanson
and Timothy White dig up some fossilized bones and call them “Lucy”
near the Awash River in Afar region. This partial skeleton of a hominid
(human ancestor) is approximately 3.2 million years old. The Johanson’s
team later named the previously unknown species Australopithecus
afarensis: apes that took the first steps towards being us. Lucy was a hominid.9
She was a human being. She belonged to the genus Homo and to the
species sapiens; thinking man. Perhaps, I should say wise or knowing
man; a man who was smart enough to recognize that he is a man. Lucy’s
head, on the evidence of the bits of her skull that had been recovered,
was not much larger than a softball. She herself stood only three and one
half feet tall, although she was fully grown. That could be deduced from
her wisdom teeth, which were fully erupted and had been exposed to
several years of wear. My best guess was that she was between twentyfive and thirty years old when she died. She has already begun to show
the onset of arthritis or some other bone ailment, on the evidence of
deformation of her vertebrae. If she had lived much longer, it probably
would have begun to bother her. Her surprisingly good condition, her
completeness, came from the fact that she had died quietly. There were
no tooth marks on her bones. They had not been crunched and splintered,
as they would have been if she had been killed by a lion or a sabertoothed cat. Her head had not been carried off in one direction and her
legs in another, as hyenas might have done with her.
She had simply settled down in one piece right where she was, in the
sand of a long-vanished lake edge or stream and died. Whether from
illness or accidental drowning, it was impossible to say. The important
thing was that she had not been found by a predator just after death and
eaten. Her carcass had remained inviolate, slowly covered by sand or
9
Scientists nicknamed the fossils “Lucy” after the song playing on their radio at that
time, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” by “The Beatles.” And Lucy will unlock the secret
story of afarensis.
19
mud, buried deeper and deeper, the sand hardening into rock under the
weight of subsequent depositions. She had lain silently in her adamantine
grave for millennium after millennium until the rains at Hadar in Ethiopia
had brought her to light again. She is not just who lived and died in the
African bush. It’s not much of an epitaph, but the afarensis’ species that has
begun the journey to you and me. Her hands were, in life, little more than
climbing tools. In generations to come, they’ll find a million uses. They’ll
search out food for a growing brain and one day make tools to change
the world around them. And freed the task of helping her move, the
muscles of her chest will help her descendents to speak. Her adaptation,
standing on two feet, opens doors for the future. She is, indeed, just an
ape… but an ape with potential. And, knowing that her story will end in us;
is there anything else we can see in afarensis that we might one day
inherit?
At the same time, another enormously significant change was also
taking place. When they first came out of forest to the ground, man’s
apelike predecessors must have relied almost exclusively on their fingers
and on their teeth to obtain food. Then gradually, they began to adapt to
life on the ground in a fashion unique to themselves. They discovered the
value of tools: very primitive ones at first, no doubt, perhaps no more
complex than the sticks which chimpanzees use to dig out termites. The
important point is, however, that these hominids did not stop there, they
went on to develop tools that were much more elaborate and, in the
process of doing so, they acquired fingers and thumbs suitable for the
manipulation of comparatively complex instruments. It must have taken
a very long time to evolve. Much time, too, must have been required for
the hominids to acquire the important physical characteristics that
enabled the Australopithecines to move in an erect position, bipedal,
with their bodies supported on their legs. It was, of course, no coincidence
that all these various changes, in the teeth and the fingers and thumbs, in
the pelvis, and the leg and the foot, should have taken place in the same
animals. With each new shift toward bipedalism, the hominids’ hands
were left free to make and to use tools. As they came to rely more on
tools, they had a greater incentive to depend on their legs for support.
So they experienced a further shift toward bipedalism.
In other words, the hominids evolved through a continual process of
feedback, with the use of tools and their bipedal posture acting as mutual
cause and effect. While the idea of evolutionary progress by feedback
20
may seem very obvious once it has been suggested, it is in fact a radical
departure from traditional thinking, and has begun to win acceptance
only in the past decade. Actually, all evolutionary progress not only that
of man, has taken place through a series of very tiny changes, each one at
once producing some small advantage and paving the way for the next
change. Evolutionary change will only occur, if it happens to fit in with an
animal’s general make-up: with its anatomy, its situation and its behavior.
All three depend very largely on where and how it gets its food. Perhaps the
hominids first began to use tools not to dig for food, but as weapons to defend
themselves against predators. In any case, by the time they reached the
Australopithecine stage, the hominids had moved on to using sticks and
pebbles to kill small animals for food. Instead of being preyed upon, they
were the predators, and very much more efficient ones than any baboon
or chimpanzee. They were the hunters of African savannah. Between 4.5 to
3.5 million years ago Australopithecus afarensis and their counter parts
Australopithecus anamensis evolved in Africa. At the same time
Australopithecus africanus and Paranthropus aethiopicus branched off
from the same tree at this same period. And from africanus and
aethiopicus, Paranthropus boisei and Paranthropus robustus evolved
sometime between 3 and 2 million years ago.
Kenyanthropus platyops10 – (3.5 million years old)
Working in Lomekwi, west of Lake Turkana region of northern Kenya, a
research team led by paleontologists Meave Leakey and Justus Edung
uncovered in 1999 a cranium and other bone remains of an early human
that showed a mixture of features unseen in previous discoveries of early
human fossils. This is a nearly complete skull but heavily distorted with a
large flat face and small teeth. The brain size is similar to that of the
australopithecines. The remains were estimated to be 3.5 million years
old, and the cranium’s small brain and ear-hole were similar to those of
the very earliest humans. Its cheekbone, however, joined the rest of the
face in a forward position, and the region beneath the nose opening was
flat. These are traits found in later human fossils from around 2 million
years ago, typically those classified in the genus Homo. Noting this unusual
combination of traits, researchers named a new genus and species,
“Kenyanthropus platyops, or “flat-faced human from Kenya.” Before this
discover y, it seemed that only a single early human species,
10
Kenyanthropus platyops fossils, at present are preserved in the Nairobi Museum.
Scientists believe that platyops and afarensis lived side by side in Africa. However, the
relationship between K. platyops and A. afarensis will remain a mystery until more finds
are made.
21
“Austalopithecus afarensis,” lived in East Africa between 4 million and 3
million years ago. Yet, Kenyanthropus indicates that a diversity of species,
including a more humanlike lineage than A. afarensis, lived in this time
period, just as in most other eras in human prehistory.
Australopithecus africanus – (3.1 to 2.1 million years old)
The gracile ape-man africanus is represented by the fossils of the
Taung child and Mrs Ples.11 The name Australopithecus was first applied,
along with the species name A. africanus, to a fossil found by Raymond
Dart in 1924 at Taung, South Africa. It was named as “Taung Child,”
belonged to an individual that died between the ages of 3 to 4 years. The
fossil consists of a partial skull with a face, partial endocast and partial
mandible. The canine teeth are small and humanlike. The position of the
foramen magnum suggests that this hominid was a biped. In short, the
Taung fossil was determined to be the remains of an immature or juvenile
specimen. This species is slightly more advanced than afarensis, with a
larger cranial capacity and larger teeth. It is found at sites throughout
South Africa and is particularly prevalent at Sterkfontein, but as yet it has
not been found elsewhere in Africa. It has been suggested that africanus
has longer arms and shorter legs than afarensis, which at first would
suggest that it was more primitive. However, its facial characteristics are
much more human-like. A. africanus was probably descended from A.
afarensis and lived in southern Africa between about 3 and 2 million
years ago. Its braincase was small. A. africanus stood about 150 cm tall
and weighed between 35 and 60 kg. Its face, skull base, and dentition
were all markedly less apelike and more human than were those of A.
afarensis.
Australopithecus garhi – (2.4 million years old)
The last of the definitive australopithecines, this species is a recent
addition to the genus Australopithecus. Discovered by Tim White’s team
in the Middle Awash region of Ethiopia, garhi appears to be more
advanced than afarensis, displaying a mixture of both gracile and robust
tendencies. Named after the Afar word for surprise, garhi has been found
in association with stone tools, but there is no evidence yet that it was
11
On 18 April 1947, Robert broom and John Robinson found an adult version of the
‘Taung Child, and Broom believed it to have been that of a middle-aged female. Broom
christened the find ‘Plesianthropus africanus, which the media soon shortened to
‘Mrs Ples.’
22
capable of making tools. Fragmentary postcranial evidence suggests
that garhi had both long arms and long legs, giving it unusual body
proportions compared to other early hominids.
Australopithecus sediba - (2 to 1.7 million years old)
In report being published in the journal “Science,” Paleoanthropologist
Mathew Berger and a team of scientists said the newly discovered fossils
from a boy and a woman were a surprising mixture of primitive and
advanced anatomy and thus qualified as a new species of hominid, the
ancestors and other close relatives of humans. It has been named
Australopithecus sediba, it was found in August, 2008. The species sediba,
which means fountain or wellspring in Sotho, strode upright on long legs,
with human-shaped hips and pelvis, but still climbed through trees on
apelike arms. It had the small teeth and more modern face of Homo, the
genus that includes modern humans, but the relatively primitive feet
and “tiny brain” of Australopithecus, Berger said. Geologists estimated
that the individuals lived 1.78 to 1.95 million years ago, probably closer
to the older date, when australopithecines and early species of Homo
were contemporaries. Scientists not involved in the research are debating
whether the bones belong to the Homo or Australopithecus genus, but
most agree that the discovery is a major advance in the early fossil history
of hominids.
Paranthropus
Formerly classified as a robust form of Australopithecus, but now more
frequently put into the separate genus Paranthropus. Paranthropus fossils
are characterized by massive teeth and jaw muscles, which indicate a
low-nutrition vegetarian diet (lots of chewing to extract nutrients) that
may have been an adaptation to the drier African environment 3 million
years ago. Recent examinations of its hand bones have revealed that
Paranthropus had the capability to manufacture and manipulate stone
tools, which are often found in association with fossil remains. However,
there is still no definitive evidence that Paranthropus or Homo made the
tools found in the fossil sites in the Cradle of Humankind. Paranthropus
had a relatively smaller brain than contemporaneous hominids in the
genus Homo, but a slightly larger brain than the gracile australopithecines.
Paranthropus aethiopicus – (2.6 to 2.2 million years old)
Found in Kenya and Ethiopia, the earliest known robust species,
Paranthropus aethiopicus, lived in eastern Africa by 2.7 million years ago.
23
In 1985 at West Turkana, Kenya, American paleoanthropologist Alan Walker
discovered a 2.6 million year old fossil skull that helped to define this
species. It became known as the “Black Skull” 12 because of the color it
had absorbed from minerals in the ground. This species aethiopicus is
suspected to be the common ancestor of the later paranthropines. It is
the first species in the hominid fossil record to exhibit the massive teeth
and chewing muscles that characterize the shift to a vegetarian lifestyle
brought about by the aridification of Africa and the disappearance of the
Miocene forests. The skull had a tall sagittal crest toward the back of its
cranium and a face that projected far outward from the forehead. P.
aethiopicus shared some primitive features with A. afarensis, that is,
features that originated in the earlier East African autralopiths. This may
indicate that P. aethiopicus evolved from A. afarensis. Many scientists
believe that robust australopiths represent a distinct evolutionary group
of early humans because these species share features associated with
heavy chewing. According to this view, Paranthropus aethiopicus
diverged from other australopiths and later gave rise to P. boisei and P.
robustus.
Paranthropus boisei – Known as ‘Zinj’ (2.2 to 1.2 million
years old)
Now, we’ll have to leap forward 40,000 generations to two million
years before your time where life on earth has a brand new face. It’s a
critical moment in our story. This was the crossroads in our evolution. At
Zinjanthropus
After a couple of million years of boisei’s demise, scientists would unearth a skull
in 400 pieces of Paranthropus boisei and was carefully reassembled, which was
famously known as “Zinj” found by Dr. Louis Leakey and his wife Mary, on 17 th July
1959 on a living floor in Olduvai Gorge bed dated to 2 million years ago. Zinj is
sometimes known as “nutcracker man” because of the huge teeth, wide zygomatic
arches, and a crest along the top of the skull which anchored the chewing muscles.
Louis Leakey originally called this species Zinjanthropus boisei, which means
“Boisei’s East African Man.” Charles Boise was a businessman who sponsored
Leakey’s expeditions. The old skull lacked only the lower jaw. The facial contours
are very much like modern man, although the flat forehead is primitive. The Leakeys
also found other fossils that indicated that the skull had been found in what might
have been a Stone Age home.
12
Black Skull is the best fossil example of aethiopicus. It is best preserved in the Nairobi
Museum.
24
this time, there are new several contenders of ape-men in Africa, who
could be our ancient ancestors. One of them is “Paranthropus boisei.” We
can call “boisei” for short. If you have to pick one modern species that they
remind you of, it would probably be the gorilla. To uncover the next step in
our human story, we’re going to have to watch the boisei closely. The
Africa of two million years ago is one of the most diverse habitats on
earth with creatures both familiar and strange. Dinofelis, the false sabertooth, and the giant elephant like Deinotherium, the browsing
Ancylotherium and unlike anything we can imagine in the 21st century.
There were many two-legged ape-men: the impish scavenger habilis:
Homo habilis, the odd-looking creature, their slightly bigger rival rudolfensis:
Homo rudolfensis, (more to read on these two species later in this chapter)
and the gorilla like boisei, a whole range of upright apes. Each of them
has a different strategy for survival and from only one we’ve inherited
our own way of life. The question is which one? Who do you most
recognize in yourself?
To find out, we must first ask, why two million years ago, we find so
many different ape-men? The answer lies not in India, but in space. We
must look to the sun. As the earth orbits the sun, it’s always on a slight
angle, a tilt. It’s this that gives us our seasons. The bigger the tilt, the more
severe they’ll be. But the tilt is always changing and around three million
years before the 21st century, it was getting bigger. On earth, the summer
got colder. At the poles, ice made during winter didn’t melt properly
during summer. Year by year, the polar ice caps grew. They locked up
huge amounts of the planet’s water. The earth began to dry out. In East
Africa, the changes started millions of years before, with the retreat of
the rainforests intensified. An alien species took hold; grass… which came
in many forms. And with alien plants came alien animals, with bizarre
adaptations to exploit the new foods, like the improbable four stomachs
of an eland. 13 Elands are gregarious animals. that can digest tough grass
like a cow does. Each new animal created new food and new creatures
evolved to eat it. And it was the food that was the key to the puzzle of why
there was such a diversity of ape-men at that time.
Africa offers a huge variety of different things to eat and ways to live
and all kinds of animals have evolved as a consequence, from the
Ancylotherium to our ape-men. Take reeds at the river bank, for instance,
we can’t eat this sort of food, but there is a species of ape-man that can;
the boisei. These magnificent creatures have adapted brilliantly to make
the most of the foods that surround them. Powerful muscles in their cheeks
an enormous jaw, and back teeth four times the size of our own means,
13
Eland is a large antelope with humped shoulders, a dewlap, and tightly spiraling horns.
25
they can eat the toughest vegetation, like the roots of the reeds. Their
special adapting ability, make the boisei very successful. With ample food
all around, there’s plenty of time left over for any ape-man’s favorite pass
time… sex. Grooming is how all apes bond with each other and the boisei
are no exception. Although almost entirely vegetarian, we know from
tell-tale signs in their teeth, that there’s one kind of meat a boisei can’t
resist… termites. Homo habilis don’t have the special adaptations of the
boisei. Without such special adaptation, the habilis had to take a very
different track. Habilis have developed into the archetypal jack of all
trades, inquisitive scavengers, prepared to try anything to survive. This
new way of living is tough, but being inquisitive has given habilis some
new tricks. Because if you’re inquisitive, you investigate mysteries… like
why do vultures gather together? The answer, of course, is that they’ve
spotted food. An eland has been caught and killed on the savannah. The
carcass is a godsend. Not only is it food, it’s a valuable protein and animal
fat, and unlike the boisei, habilis eat meat. Normally, the dominant male
would approach a carcass warily, particularly one so fresh. Whatever killed,
it could still be around. Other ape-men have also spotted the vultures.
Habilis aren’t the only scavengers around. A rival species, rudolfensis, has
also come for the meat. Habilis and rudolfensis are remarkably similar and
frequently driven to fight each other for food.
And sadly for boisei, like modern day gorillas, they are useless at
building shelters. The boisei and habilis embody two different approaches
to survival. Habilis are the jack of all trades, the boisei the masters of just
one. But which trait will be passed on to future ape-men? Although the
boisei’s lifestyle is very successful, it’s a success only as long as their
world doesn’t change. If there’s one thing you can bet on with weather
and environment, it’s that nothing stays the same forever. Over the next
several hundred thousand years, the same forces which created the vast
range of environments in Africa will continue to shape the continent. Just
as before, new habitats will appear, along with new animals to exploit
them and old ways of life will die, and old species of animals with them.
Caught up in all this change, the boisei will find in a world they’re simply
unprepared for. Their successful way of life hides the fact that the boisei have
put all their evolutionary eggs in one basket. The trouble with being a
specialist in a changing world is that you end up getting left behind.
Perhaps they won’t be able to cope with vegetation changes, or new
animals will make their lives difficult. The truth is that these impressive
creatures are at an evolutionary dead end. In a few hundreds thousand
years, they will be gone. They are undoubtedly adapted to their
surroundings, but they’re not adaptable enough to keep up with the
changes going on around them.
26
Paranthropus robustus – (2 to 1 million years old)
Rubustus 14 is the southern African version of the robust ape-men.
Often called the flat-faced ape-man because of its dished-out facial area,
it is the most common hominid in southern Africa and probably the best
represented fossil hominid in the African record. In 1938 and a decade
later, Broom discovered at Kromdraai and Swartkrans, South Africa,
hominid specimens that he initially judged to represent a genus separate
from the Australopithecus remains found earlier in the same region by
Dart. He estimated its weight to have been about 68 kg. P. robustus lived
between 2 and 1 million years ago. A pattern of dentition and of
specialized diet that first appeared in A. africanus became more
pronounced in the robust australopithecines. The molars and premolars
of P. robustus are greatly enlarged to form a battery of flat grinders, while
its canines and incisors are only of normal size. This suggests that P.
robustus was adapted to eat a diet of rough vegetable matter that was
high in bulk and low in nutrition. The more equitable teeth types of A.
afarensis, by contrast, suggest a generalized, omnivorous diet that
included meat.
The First Humans
The fossil evidence of the australopithecines has been seen by some
scholars as merely representing temporal stages within a single evolving
hominid lineage leading to Homo erectus and thence to Homo sapiens.
Others have stressed the extent of the adaptive differences between the
various fossils and have suggested that there may have been two, or
even three, lineages evolving in parallel, only one of which led to the
later species of Homo. Whatever the details of their interpretations,
however, most hominid paleontologists are agreed that the
australopithecines represent a link, direct or indirect between the fossil
apes and human beings. Thus, the study of the australopithecines is
regarded as the study of one of the most important stages in the
emergence of modern H. sapiens. Chronologically H. erectus is preceded
by Australopithecus, a more apelike hominid, and is succeeded by H.
sapiens. On the other hand, Homo habilis, whose remains have been
recovered from sites between 2 million and 1.5 million years old, may be
a transitional stage between Australopithecus and H. erectus.
14
A. africanus gave rise only to the southern species A. robustus. The last robust
australopiths died out about 1.4 million years ago. At about this time, climate patterns around
the world entered a period of fluctuation, and these changes may have reduced the food
supply on which robusts depended.
27
As the australopithecines declined in diversity, they were replaced
by the first humans. But the origin of humans is not a straight forward
affair. The evolutionary history of the first humans is remarkable for two
things: A rapid and huge increase in brain size coupled with the development
of stone tool kits. We shall find out who the most ancient humans were,
and who among these were most likely to have been or direct ancestor.
Around 2.4 million years ago two new kinds of hominids appeared in
East Africa. They are recognized as being the earliest humans: Homo
habilis and Homo rudolfensis. At the same time stone tools appeared in
the archaeological record, but we are not sure who made them. Homo
habilis was smaller in body size and had a brain capacity similar to that of
the robust australopithecines. The arms of this hominid were probably
long relative to the legs, but it walked upright. Homo rudolfensis was
bigger in body size and had a much larger brain (50% more) than that of
Homo habilis. The arms of this hominid were relatively shorter than those
of Homo habilis. Although we cannot be certain, it seems most likely that
both H. habilis and Homo rudolfensis were our direct ancestors and the
makers of the first stone tools.
Prehistoric Stone Tools
Chimpanzees particularly use simple tools made out of wood, twigs,
sticks, and even stones, so, it seems likely that early humans definitely
have done the same. However, much of these materials do not preserve
in the fossil record so we do not know about the technologies of the
earliest hominid species. As far as we know, the earliest members of the
genus Homo were the first hominids to use tools to make other tools
made of stone. The First Stone Tool Kit is the oldest technology known to
mankind. It is characterized by simple flaked cores where only a few
flakes have been taken off. The cores may have been used as functional
tools, while the flakes may have been used as knives to dismember game
carcasses or to strip tough plants. These early tools are called Oldowan, or
Oldowan Industry, after Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania where they were first
found. The oldest appeared about 2.6 million years ago and were found
in Gona, Ethiopia. Oldowan tools mark the beginning of a stone
technological development that involved learning through copying to
pass on skills down the generations. Tool types include spheroids or
hammerstones, scrapers and anvils, and unmodified stones or manuports.
Toolmakers in the Middle Paleolithic15 used a range of retouched
flake tools, especially side-scrapers, serrated scrapers, backed knives
Paleolithic is the early part of the Stone Age, when early human beings made
chipped-stone tools, from 750,000 to 15,000 years ago.
15
28
(blade tools with the non-blade side dulled to fit comfortably in the
hand), and points. Experts believe these tool were used to work animal
hides, to shape wood implements, and as projectile points. This period is
also characterized by the use of specially prepared cores. Using the disc
core method, a circular core could produce numerous flakes to serve as
blanks for retouched tools. With the Levallois method (named after a
suburb of Paris, France, where the first such artifacts were discovered),
flakes of a predetermined shape were removed from specially prepared
cores. This process resulted in oval-shaped flakes or large, triangular points,
depending on the type of Levallois core. Levallois cores and flakes are
first seen at some late Acheulean sites but become much more common
in the Middle Paleolithic and Middle Stone Age. Early hominids made
stone artifacts either by smashing rocks between a hammer and anvil
(known as the bipolar technique) to produce usable pieces or by a more
controlled process termed “flaking”, in which stone chips were fractured
away from a larger rock by striking it with a hammer of stone or other
hard material. Later, especially during the last 10,000 years, other
techniques of producing stone artifacts including pecking, grinding,
sawing, and boring became more common. The best rocks for flaking
tended to be hard, fine-grained, or amorphous (having no crystal
structure) rocks, including lava, obsidian, ignimbrite, flint, chert, quartz,
silicified limestone, quartzite, and indurated shale. Ground stone tools
could be made on a wider range of raw material types, including coarser
grained rocks such as granite.
Homo erectus produced stone tools which indicate an improved
technological skill. This improved tool kit is called Acheulean after the
site of St. Acheul in France where the first tools of this kind were found.
However, the oldest ones are found in East Africa and are dated 1.7 million
years. The Acheulean tools were made by Homo erectus and the
subsequent descendants for more than one million years, becoming more
refined over time, an indication of some form of communication and
social structure. The Acheulean industrial complex is differentiated from
the preceding Oldowan tool kit by the ability to detach large flakes,
which were then modified further to make various tool types, the best
examples being handaxes, cleavers, knives, picks, collectively referred
to as bifaces, or Large Cutting Tools (LCTs). This technology has also been
found in Europe and Asia. As Homo erectus traveled from Africa, the
Acheulean tool kit and the knowledge to make it were taken along. These
tools were probably used for more than one task. Isimila near Iringa in
29
western Tanzania 16 is one of the most important Stone Age sites in Africa.
Large numbers of fine Acheulean hand axes and cleavers can be seen
under protective shelters. The age of the site is estimated to be between
300,000 to 400,000 years old. The erosion of the site has exposed
incredible layers of soil and geological sequence.
Homo rudolfensis – (2.4 to 1.8 million years ago)
Rudolfensis was named after Lake Rudolph, the colonial name for Lake
Turkana, where its fossilized remains were found by Richard Leakey in
the late 1960s and 1970s. The best known fossils of H. rudolfensis come
from the areas surrounding
Rudolfensis
this lake and date from about
The argument for rudolfensis as a separate
species is a tenuous one because of the lack of 1.8 million years ago.
strong fossil evidence. Indeed, some scientists Paleoanthropologists have
have rather unkindly described rudolfensis as not determined the entire
a garbage-can species, consisting of all the time range during which H.
‘throwaway’ bits of fossils that can’t be neatly rudolfensis may have lived. H.
ascribed to habilis or ergaster. It has been rudolfensis had a larger brain
tentatively associated with simple flake tool than H. habilis and also had
technology.
fairly large teeth, approaching
the size of those in robust
australopiths. It is hypothesized that H. rudolfensis congregated near
areas that offered many different food resources, such as lake margins,
stream confluences and hills. Scientists have found several modern
looking thighbones that date from between 2 million and 1.8 million
years ago and may belong to H. rudolfensis. These bones suggest a body
size of 1.5 m (5 feet) and 52 kg (114 lb).
Homo habilis: Handy Man – (2 to 1.6 million years ago)
But, the part, that habilis plays in the story of you and I will be very
different. Their scavenging, inquisitive lifestyle has made quick-witted
and inventive, and it’s led to a real breakthrough. Habilis are the first
creatures on earth to be able to make stone tools. It’s hugely important leap
forward, for stone tools give them access to an amazing range of different
foods. But first they have to be able to get to them, and that’s where
habilis’ second secret weapon comes in. Eating meat has brought habilis
16
Isimilia is a quite and well preserved Stone Age site in the world. Too many stone
tools around the site could raise the issue of credibility and authenticity of the tools.
But the site is genuine and picturesque.
30
the essential protein and fat to allow the development of their brains. In
fact, habilis’ brains are almost half as big as those of the boisei. Meat has
enabled them to grow smarter, smart enough to know that you stand
more chance of scaring off a lion if you work as a team. Welcome to the
new world of ideas, although the eland carcass is almost totally stripped
of meat, there is one last meal left if you can get at it; bone marrow, one of
the most nutritious foods on the savannah. Neither lions nor vultures can
reach it, yet habilis’ new tools seem almost purpose-built for the job.
Habilis’ jack of all trades way of life gives them a chance of surviving in
an ever changing world. It’s this trait that will live on and be essential in
us. So, we’ve seen in habilis the next step forward towards you and me.
By being able to live in different ways instead of being trapped in just
one, they’ve begun to free themselves from the rules governing all other
life on earth. So, it is habilis which will dominate Africa in the millennia to
come. Well, you might think so… but the end of our story has a strange
twist. Round about now, two million years ago, an ape-man appears in
East Africa which does what habilis does, only better. And they have
something else, which means that they could hound habilis out of existence.
They are Homo georgicus, Mrs. Ples and Homo ergaster. They are the
creatures we will meet next on the journey from apes to angels.
Homo georgicus (1.8 million years ago)
Relatively recently, may be less than 100,000 years ago, roving bands
of Homo sapiens looking pretty much like us left Africa and diversified
into all the races that we see around the world today: Inuit, native
Americans, native Australians, Chinese, Indians, and so on. It is to this recent
exodus that the phrase “out of Africa” is normally applied. But there was
an earlier exodus from Africa, and these Homo erectus pioneers left fossils
in Asia and Europe, including the Java and Peking specimens. The oldest
fossil known outside Africa was found in the central Asian country of
Georgia and dubbed “Georgian Man”: a diminutive creature whose rather
well-preserved-skull is dated, by modern methods, to about 1.8 million
years ago. It has been called Homo georgicus, to indicate that it seems
rather more primitive than the rest of the early refugees from Africa, who
are all classified as Homo erectus. Some stone tools slightly older than
Georgian Man have just been discovered in Malaysia, sparking a new
search for fossil bones in that peninsula. But in any case, all these early
Asian fossils are pretty close to modern humans and all are nowadays
classified in the genus Homo.
31
Mrs Ples
Slightly older than the Taung Child, one of the most beautifully
preserved skulls we have, although lacking a lower jaw, is called “Mrs
Ples.” Mrs Ples, who may actually have been a small male rather than a
large female, obtained “her” nickname because she was originally
classified in the genus “Plesianthropus.” This means “nearly human,” which
is better name than “Southern Ape.” One might have hoped that, when
later taxonomists decided that Mrs Ples and her kind were really of the
same genus as the Taung Child, Plesianthropus would have become the
name for all of them. Unfortunately, the rules of zoological nomenclature
are strict to the point of pedantry. Priority of naming takes precedence
over sense and suitability. “Southern Ape” might be a lousy name but no
matter: it predates the much more sensible Plesianthropus and we seem
to be stuck with it.
Homo ergaster – (1.5 million years to 400,000 years ago)
Southern Africa, it was one and half million years ago. The people
lived in Africa known as Homo ergaster. By looking at the bones and relics
that these people will one day leave behind modern day scientists get a
good idea of the part they play in the evolution of you and me. And by
watching their everyday lives closely, we can see the seeds of humanity
developing in these ape-men. We can also see how much of the apeman remains alive in us. Homo ergaster can walk fast and cover vast
distances at speed even in bad conditions. They have the most
sophisticated cooling system of any animal on earth. Long, modern looking
noses cool and moisten air as they breathe in… hairless bodies let heat
escape. And millions of tiny glands in their skin mean that they control
their temperature by sweating. So, while other animals take cover in the
shade, ergaster can stride out in the sun and they have another
adaptation… an enormous brain, around two thirds the size of yours and
mine. In fact, it’s from ergaster that we inherit our big brains. With their new
brainpower, ergaster can understand the world around them like no other
creature. Their insight into their surroundings is nothing short of
revolutionary.
All animals have some understanding of their environment. A five
month old swallow can instinctively negotiate the 10,000 km journey
from Britain to South Africa without having done it before. An old matriarch
elephant can remember a place to find water in the driest of seasons,
32
even if she’s only been there once, half a century earlier. But until now, no
creatures have pieced together knowledge of their world from
apparently unrelated clues found around them. Among all the animals on
earth only you and I can see these marks for what they are… hoof-prints
made by an animal that went that way. Ergaster is the creature we get
that skill from. For them, it’s the key to unlock nature’s secrets. They can
understand that a particular kind of cloud signals rain… that the arrival of
a new type of bird, like the swallows means a change in season and new
opportunities. Even if they’ve never seen a particular kind of animal
before, they can still place it within the jigsaw of their world. Ergaster’s
new way of seeing the world is a milestone on the journey that will lead to us.
And bigger brains allow ergaster to do something else, making an
extraordinary technological breakthrough. They’ve created the Rolls Royce
of stone axes, heavy and powerful, yet precise enough for delicate cuts. It
shows both planning and vision and because these axes are found all
over Africa and we know these people could share with each other the
secret of how to make them. A million and a half years before your time,
the axe made by ergaster was the most sophisticated object on the planet.
So, ergaster’s big brains have completely changed how they live, but
surprisingly, it’s not in order to make tools or understand their environment
that ergaster’s brain has evolved.
A big brain is surprisingly expensive to run in terms of the amount of
energy it uses. Ergaster’s brain is so energy-hungry, it consumes about a
sixth of all the calories they consume in a day. For such a gas-guzzler to
be worthwhile, it must be absolutely vital for these people’s survival. And
indeed it is. They can deal with the most complicated things in their
world. Why ergaster and we need a big brain for, is for understanding
other people? Ergaster’s work together to find, stalk and kill their prey
and they will even take food back to share with other individuals in their
group. Meat is not simply food but a potential bargaining tool for later
favors. Almost everything about ergaster has brought them surprising
benefits in their complex new world of relationships. Like the fact that
they sweat instead of pant to lose heat even when they working hard.
This has given them much more control of their breathing, freeing up
their body for something increasingly useful, making sounds. Ergaster
are the first of our ancestors to have what we would recognize as a human
voice and communicating each other: using sounds is central to their way of
life. Ergaster don’t have permanent home bases. Instead, they move from
place to place, depending on where they can find food. They can feed
33
themselves from what they gather around them. But the return of the
hunters, with potential meat to share is a special event. This is a scene
unlike any seen on earth before, a group of animals held together not by
safety in numbers, nor by an individual male, but by something potentially
much more powerful; the ties of family and friends. Helping others and
relying on others to help you, has become the glue holding these people
together… from a mother offering food and support to her pregnant
daughter to the beginning of a new kind of relationship, males and females
pairing up and living together, at least for a time, monogamously. To help
them in this new world of depending on each other ergaster have
developed a unique mutation. We believe they are the first of our
ancestors to have very noticeable whites to their eyes. Like us, they can
learn to fathom each others minds and communicate at a glance hidden
depths of meaning. Living together in the beginnings of a complex society
with big brains to help them understand each other is the next step on the
journey to you and me.
Out of Africa
Africa gave the world humankind. It is scientifically uncontested that
the earliest hominids developed in Africa and that Homo erectus led the
first wave of migrations into the rest of the world approximately 1.8 million
years ago. Erectus populations soon established themselves in most of
the habitable areas in Europe and Asia. There are two main schools of
thought as to how modern humans originated:
A. The Multi-Regional Hypothesis holds that H. sapiens evolved originally
from the erectus populations distributed throughout the world. The
implication is that Chinese H. sapiens had a fundamentally different origin
from African H. sapiens and that differences between people are more
biologically than culturally entrenched.
B. The Out-of-Africa Hypothesis postulates that H. sapiens developed
in Africa and then migrated from the continent, gradually replacing H.
erectus populations in the rest of the world because of their superior
technology and communication skills.
Modern genetic research increasingly supports the out-of-Africa
hypothesis, showing that there is a greater genetic diversity among
Africans than between Africans and other populations. Fundamentally,
this means that Africans are ‘older’ and other race groups ‘younger’.
Geneticists believe that we are all descended from a population of
34
modern H. sapiens that lived somewhere in Africa approximately 100,000
years ago. Archaeological evidence suggests that an ‘African Eve’ lived
Mitochondrial Eve
All human Mitochondrial DNA originated from a single ancestral lineage,
specifically a single female, fairly recently and has been mutating ever since.
Most estimates of the mutation rate of mtDNA suggest that this female ancestor
lived about 200,000 years ago. In addition, the mtDNA of African populations
varies more than that of peoples in other continents. This suggests that the mtDNA
of African populations has changed for a longer time than it has in populations of
any other region, and that all living people inherited their mtDNA from one
woman in Africa, who is sometimes called the ‘African Eve’ or “Mitochondrial Eve.’
Some geneticists and anthropologists have concluded from this evidence that
modern humans originated in a small populations in Africa and spread from there.
in southern Africa. Nowhere else in the world is there a comparable record
of evolutionary development demonstrating how Homo erectus evolved
into a archaic form of H. sapiens, which became refined into modern H.
sapiens. One of the plausible theories on the origin of modern humans is
that a sustainable population of archaic sapiens was cut off from the
African interior by the expansion of the Kalahari and Karoo deserts around
200,000 years ago. The group found itself trapped in the narrow coastal
plains between the Atlantic and the mountains of the edge of the desert.
This is why their food consumption became increasingly marine-focused.
Their diet of shellfish, mussels and fish, with its high protein levels, may
have contributed to the development of the modern human brain.
Homo erectus – (1.8 million years to 400,000 years ago)
We can say, however, that wherever Homo specimens are found from
between 1.6 million and about half a million years ago, they can be labeled
Homo erectus, tall, strong individuals with relatively large brains, a fairly
long cranium, thick skull bones, forward-jutting face, and prominent brow
ridge. Next step in human evolution we meet Homo erectus on our
journey to you and me. They were widely distributed in Africa, Europe
and Asia. From Indonesia was known as Pithecanthropus, from China as
Sinanthropus, but from Africa started as Homo erectus. Evolution enabled
erectus to do this shift, that’s never happened before in the history of human
life on earth. It has given them the ability to leave their ancestral home, Africa
and begin to populate the rest of the world. It is Homo erectus whose eyes are
the first to see the wonders of the eastern world. They began by following
the course of the River Nile, across Africa and into the Middle East. Their
35
numbers growing, they spread further in their search for food, reaching
Asia; the first of our ancestors to tread on this side of the earth as far as the
southern reaches of China. Their epic journey took thousands of years. It’s
a curious fact that when we find evidence of these first Asians, we never
find the elaborate stone axes their cousins in Africa used. It could be they
found a different kind of tool, easier to work, and in this vast kingdom, all
around them; bamboo. Erectus live in a land where tools grow like trees.
Small deer and pigs are everywhere in the dense bamboo forests, but
erectus are not fussy. In time, our ancestors will change the world as no
animal has done before. Many creatures that get in their way will be
swept aside. For all the confidence of erectus, there are still things in this
new world with the capacity to scare like the massive Gigantopithecus 17
an ancient ape over three meters tall, the original King Kong. In time, the
balance of power will shift. Erectus are tough and adaptable and in this
ancient Asian landscape, they’ll do well. We know that H. erectus was a
highly successful species, able to extend its territory outside Africa by a
million years ago. Such an expansion implies population growth, and this
may well have included a push into robust australopithecine habitat.
Caught between this and the simultaneous expansion of populations of
baboons, the robust australopithecines may have succumbed to
competition of a more basic sort: access to food sources. A million years
ago, the double-edged competition became too stiff, and the
australopithecines became extinct, breaking forever a living link with
our ancestors.
Big Boy: “Turkana Boy”
One of the best known species of Homo erectus is the “Turkana Boy,”
an almost complete skeleton of a boy, which is dated to about 1.6 million
years ago, found at Nariokotome on the western side of the Lake Turkana
in Kenya by Kamoya Kimeu in August 1984. As a skilled fossil hunter
Kamoya was able to spot it because it was slightly lighter colored than
the black lava pebble surrounding it. He found other fragments nearby
and eventually the whole bank was excavated to find almost the entire
skeleton. Despite intensive searching the bones of the feet and hands
were never discovered. He is also k nown as “Nariokotome Boy.”
Paleoanthropologists have estimated that the boy was between 9 and 12
years old and was 5 feet 1 inch (1.6 meters) tall at the time of his death, if
the “Turkana Boy” had grown to maturity, he may have grown to 1.84
17
Gigantopithecus would be an interesting parallel to South African
Australopithecus types. They too are morphologically intermediate between human and
anthropoid form; they too were interpreted by some writers as being omnivorous; some
of them are of remarkably large size and they became extinct.
36
meters tall. This was very surprising because earlier hominids were thought
to be no taller than chimpanzees, but he was similar in size and shape to
modern humans. The “Turkana Boy” was born as small and as helpless as
human babies, so that his head could pass easily through the birth canal.
Also like us, his brain of Homo erectus had a similar growth pattern to our
own. “Turkana Boy” shows key features that distinguish members of this
species from the earlier ancestors. Bigger brain (880 cm3) about 20%
bigger than that of Homo rudolfensis, shorter face, smaller molars,
projecting lower face, not flat, heavy brow ridges, short forehead, longer
legs than arms, for more effective bipedal walking. Hominids have
become ever taller throughout evolutionary history. We know roughly
how tall they were by measuring their limb bones.
Peking Man
Not until 500,000 years ago do we find plenty of evidence for the last
stage before modern man, a period of definitely humanlike creatures
with much larger brains: Peking man, is an another example of Homo erectus.
In a whole complex of ways, Peking man was a great improvement on
the Australopithecines from whom we almost certainly descended. The
Australopithecines could run and walk but not as efficiently as man. Peking
man had a striding walk like ours, and that meant he could cover, without
growing tired, the much longer distances needed to hunt large animals.
And instead of the simple chipped-pebble tools of Australopithecines,
he has developed much more effective weapons: choppers and hand
axes with which he was able to kill and cut open animals such as deer,
rhino and even elephants. Essentially, Peking man was much more
efficient than Australopithecus because he possessed a larger and more
complex brain. It was not, however, simply an across-the-board improved
version of the Australopithecine brain. It was better only in a few, highly
specific ways. Judged from our knowledge of the brain of modern man,
the part that controlled the fingers and thumbs seems to have been
much larger. So, Peking man was better able to manufacture and to handle
tools. And his brain appears to have been vastly better equipped to deal
with abstractions: to memorize and to plan, to think and to speculate.
The Master of the Planet
Bipedalism, tools, hunting, language, put them all together, and the
feedback process turns out to have been one of extraordinary complexity.
As our ancestors progressed from Australopithecus to Peking man and
from Peking man to Homo sapiens, their brains grew steadily larger. The
37
brain cells themselves became more elaborate, and so did the
mar velously intricate passageways that connected them. These
improvements in the human brain occurred as a response to the demands
made on it. With every additional contribution, there was a greater mass
of knowledge to be passed on, and that knowledge had to be learned by
each new generation of children as part of the process of growing up.
Although we cannot yet be sure, it seems likely that these advances,
biological and cultural, social and sexual, had all begun to exert their
influence on human evolution by about half a million years ago. They set
the way for all the later evolutionary advances which man was to enjoy,
notably in the size of his brain and the complexity of his thinking, until finally
he became what he is today, master of the planet. As a rational, self-conscious
animal, he stands far beyond any other primate. But reason, after all, is
only one part of that fantastically complicated organism which constitutes
man. Anatomically, he is not so very different from the great apes. In
some of his social relationships, his behavior curiously resembles that of
baboons and macaques. Emotionally, before he grows up and learns to
behave as society dictates, he is not so far removed from chimpanzee.
Certainly man deserves to be placed in a family of his own; he has come a
long way since his apelike ancestors descended from the trees. But not,
perhaps as far as we would like to think as we look with a mixture of
curiosity, awe and a strange sense of uneasiness at the monkeys and the
apes who stare back at us, their relatives, from their perches in the forest.
No doubt the first terrestrial animals from which man evolved were
bound to each other almost as closely. It was the shift to hunting which
transformed man’s social behavior and launched him along the route he
was to follow for hundreds of thousands of years. To begin with, hunting
radically altered this relationship between the sexes by imposing on
them a physical separation. For only the males could go off on the long
treks required to hunt and kill large animals. The females were not able to
accompany them because, for much of their adult lives, they were either
pregnant or were nursing their infants. Going off at dawn and returning
late in the evening, or perhaps even staying away for days at a time, the
male hunters found themselves facing a problem that no monkey or ape
ever had to contend with. They had to arrange some kind of meeting
place where they could be sure to find their females and their infants. To
achieve this purpose the idea of the base camp was conceived. There the
males of a group could meet up with the females when the hunt was
over. There they could store their weapons between hunts. And there the
infants would be comparatively safe while the males were away.
38
The invention of the base camp was one of the decisive steps in the
history of man, as one can readily see by comparing his situation with
that of any nonhuman primate, such as a baboon. A wounded or sick
baboon must keep up with the group as it moves around in search of
food. If he falls behind, he is almost certain to be killed by predators. But
once men had conceived the idea of the base camp, the individual
members of the group were very much less vulnerable, for they had only
to reach the camp to be safe. There, a man could rest and recover his
strength or treat his injuries. A minor virus disease or a badly sprained
ankle would no longer be fatal, as it must be, all too often to a baboon. It
would be merely an inconvenience. Thus man’s chance of survival was
vastly increased. And so was the sense of mutual dependence that bound
the members of a group together. A sick man who was helped to the
camp and allowed to rest there, fed by the others while he recovered his
strength, would naturally be grateful to his companions. Were the situation
to be reversed, he would do the same for them, and no doubt he often
did.
So gradually a growing sense of mutual trust was built up, and it was
not confined only to the comparatively rare occasions when within the
membership of a group someone of the group happened to find himself
in danger. As a result of hunting, men and women came to rely on each
other, as no monkeys or apes do, for food. Returning from the hunt, the
males would bring back meat which the females were eager to share. In
exchange for it, the males were given their share of the plants and roots
the females had gathered, and this daily sharing of food must have further
strengthened the bonds which held the members of a group together. By the
time they reached this stage, men and women had a great deal to
communicate to each other. Planning base camps, sharing food, reassuring
injured companions, all these activities required a system of
communication that went far beyond simple expressions of alarm or threat
or fear. We know how man met this need. He retained the system of
communication by gestures or facial expressions used by monkeys and
apes, and in addition, he also acquired a far more elaborate language
based on sounds, which enabled him to communicate ideas. So, our big
brained ancestors are flourishing all over the planet. It might seem as if a
modern world isn’t far off at all, but think again. Travel with me in time,
forward a million years and we’ll see something incredible, a mystery
which shows how hugely different these ancestors really are for you and
me.
39
We’re in Africa again. We’ve moved forward a million years, but our
ancestors haven’t moved forward at all. Our ancestors a million years
after we saw them, using original stone axes. And what are they using
now? It’s another stone hand-axe, exactly the same as the axes which
ergaster made a million years before. Their technology hasn’t advanced
in all that time. It’s almost impossible to imagine such a limited way of
thinking, but the truth is, our ancestors make an axe like a bird builds a
nest, they don’t think about it, they just do it. It’s no more possible for
these ancestors to invent better technology than for that bird to decide
to cover its nest with a roof. It’s not that our ancestors are stupid, their brains
just don’t work like ours do. It takes something extraordinary to change this
way of thinking, a trigger to set our ancestor’s minds racing, and it may
be that we know what it is. We don’t know precisely where it happened, or
when, but at some point, our ancestors gained an understanding of fire,
perhaps credited to Homo erectus. They would have undoubtedly seen it
from lightning or bush fires, but there would have been a moment when
they learnt to harness it for warmth, for safety, and as a tool, and then their
lives change. Suddenly, like no animal before them, they control their
world. And nightfall doesn’t bring danger, but something new… outside
the struggle for survival, time for the mind to wander. And perhaps fire had
the power to change more than just how our ancestors lived, but how
they could think to break the shackles in their minds and let their ideas
fly free. It could be that taming such an elemental force equipped these
men and women to move on, because move on they did. In just a few
thousand generations, their kind will dominate the world. These people
will give birth to a new kind of human altogether and that’s who we’re
going to meet now, for the final step in our journey.
Homo heidelbergensis – (600,000 to 200,000 years ago)
Southern England, 600,000 years ago, and ergaster’s descendants
are the most advanced humans to have set foot on the planet. And it is
the defining moment in the story of you and me. These people are known
as heidelbergensis 18. These men and women have brains almost as big as
ours. Though this is nearly half a million years ago, these people appear to
behave just like us. However, what heidelbergensis lack is imagination. It’s
the final key ingredient that makes you and me. This is the story of how
they found that imagination and became us. It begins with one of the
18
Homo heidelbergensis is the name of the species, which was given to a 500,000
year-old jaw found near Heidelberg, Germany.
40
most incredible experiments of all time. Heidelbergensis are spread
throughout Europe and Africa. And nature will split the population into
two, exposing the Europeans and the Africans into two different extremes.
To the north, it was an Ice Age. To the south, it was a devastating drought.
These people will struggle to survive for hundreds of thousands of years.
We’ll join them again when evolution has turned them into two separate
species. But in their struggle to adapt and survive, only one will emerge
with the gift of a modern human mind.
It’s now 140,000 years ago, and the Europe of heidelbergensis is long
gone. It’s a frozen wasteland from Scandinavia to Spain. The Ice Age turned
heidelbergensis into a new people; Neanderthals. The temperature in Europe
is above freezing. It regularly falls as low as minus 30. So, how are these
people adapted to cope in such a hostile world? One answer lies within
their bodies they’re much smaller than we are, not much over one and a
half meters. They’ve evolved a trait characteristic of all animals living in
cold places, short limbs and extremities that help keep valuable heat in
and they’ve another adaptation that helps them survive. It comes into its
own when they’re hard at work, their noses, broad and bigger than ours
and we believe they’re designed not to help keep them warm, but to
cool them down. In these surroundings, that might seem odd, but the last
thing a Neanderthal wants to do is overheat and sweat. Sweat would
simply freeze. And it’s not just their bodies which make these people so
tough. The weather has also changed their minds. Neanderthals seem
capable to shrug off extraordinary hardships … things that you and I
might find unbearable, Neanderthals ice age life has made unimaginably
tough. An X-ray of their bones would reveal a catalogue of fractures from
head to toe, like the body of a rodeo rider. But the hunters need more
than toughness, they need luck. So, where do we stand in the journey
towards you and me? Have the Neanderthals begun to see the world as
we do? Well, watching their lives, there’s a lot about the way they are,
that’s just like us, their pleasure at being reunited, their contentment with
being warm and well fed… perhaps even their amusement at someone
else’s misfortune. But in one crucial way, they and we are still completely
different.
Like heidelbergensis before them Neanderthals lack one thing:
imagination. The truth is, in their Ice Age world, they simply don’t need it.
To cope here and do well it’s physical and mental strength that’s required,
so the innovation of imagination simply hasn’t taken hold. For Neanderthal,
being strong and tough is enough. In Africa, thousands of arid years have
41
turned great tracts of the continent to near desert and the tall, strong
heidelbergensis into Cro-Magnons. These are people physically like us.
They are taller and slimmer than the Neanderthals, a good shape to cope
with the heat. And they have a dark skin to help keep safe in the sun. But
whereas the Neanderthals are getting by in their tough world, these
people are not. Unlike in an Ice Age, no amount of being tough or singleminded can help in a devastating drought. In these conditions, there is
only one thing to do: die. Yet something extraordinary is happening to
them. When species is dying out, only the most inventive and resourceful
remain alive. As the numbers fall, the fitness of the remaining population
rises. If evolution is a process of natural selection, then this is natural selection
at its most potent. Here in Africa, this extreme process has nurtured a
unique development. For example, an ostrich egg can show the evidence
of a change in the way these surviving people think, because it’s no
longer filled with yolk, but with water, and they are burying it so that they
can drink another day. This simple act is hugely significant as it shows an
ability so far missing in our human story; imagination. These people are
thinking ahead, going beyond the here and now. They can see how an
egg can be used to hold water, and how one day they might come back
this way and need to drink. Imagination is an insurance policy against the
problems of the future. With it, the tiny population of humans in Africa
can hold on, until one day, as it always does, the weather once again
changes. Around 110,000 years ago, the Great Ice Age begins to pass.
And water returns to Africa. By this time, there are as few humans left
alive. Yet, we know from studying our genes that we are all descended
from this tiny band of survivors.
Homo sapiens, sapiens
Then, abruptly, less than 200,000 years ago, a new subspecies, Homo
sapiens sapiens, from whom all human beings are descended, evolved
in what is now Kenya and Ethiopia. Both fossil and mitochondrial evidence
date this transformation at 170,000 BC. Suddenly, the tool kit of the
Neanderthals African cousins became increasingly complex. Instead of
just stone axes, spearheads, and scrapers, there appeared spear throwers,
needles of bone, barbed fishhooks, decorative beads, and vastly more
efficient ways of manufacturing stone tools. The creative and more gracile
Homo sapiens sapiens traveled to, traded with, learned from, and mated
with unrelated peers hundreds of miles away. The muscular, big-brained
Neanderthal, not built for long distance walking, remained rooted to their
42
mountain hollows, to their old-fashioned ways, and perhaps became
genetic prisoners of exclusive kinship networks. But I must admit to balking
at the idea of three or four human species coexisting a few hundred
thousand years ago, at the threshold of Homo sapiens sapiens. One notion
is that a strong evolutionary continuity through time and space, an
inexorable evolutionary force leading from Homo erectus to archaic
sapiens to Homo sapiens sapiens. Homo sapiens sapiens would eventually
emerge via an archaic sapiens intermediate (including Neanderthals in
Europe), and they would interact with one another through contact and
gene flow. Homo sapiens sapiens originated as a single evolutionary event,
a speciation in a geographically discrete population. Fully modern humans
then spread out from this geographical region, replacing existing
premodern populations throughout the Old World. In a classic paper on
the topic a decade and a half ago, William Howells of Harvard University
called this model the Noah’s Ark Hypothesis. Since then it has also been
denoted the Garden of Eden Hypothesis, and, with the more recent
molecular genetics evidence, the mitochondrial Eve Hypothesis.
Neanderthals – (230,000 to 29,000 years ago)
The term Neanderthal comes from the discovery in 1856 of human
fossils in the Little Feldhofer Cave of the Neander Valley, near Dusseldorf
in Germany (tal means Valley in German). These bones were the first to
be recognized as an early type of human. Since then, archaeologists
have discovered more fossils of Neanderthals than of any other early
human species. Because of this abundance of evidence, Neanderthals
are among the best understood of all our fossil relatives. Neandertals or
Neanderthals, prehistoric humans, who, lived in Europe, the Middle East,
and western Asia from about 200,000 to 28,000 years ago. Scientifically,
they are usually classified as a separate species, Homo neanderthalensis.
Although closely related to modern humans, known as Cro-Magnon or
Homo sapiens, Neanderthals were physically distinct, short, stark, and
they are built for brute strength. They had large protruding faces,
prominent brows, and low sloping foreheads. Their brains, however, were
fully as big as modern humans. The typical lifespan of Neanderthals was
much shorter than that of people today, with few individuals living beyond
40 years. Neanderthals don’t have much kind of capability on the long
range kills. Their spears are cruder, only work when they are extremely
close. Neanderthals put stone tips at the bamboo pole, not for throwing,
but thrusting. Because it is a weapon made from stone, you can’t throw. If
you throw, weapon hits tree or stone. It will break the weapon and it will
43
become useless. Early humans were solving the problems with
technology but Neanderthals were solving with strength.
The differences between Neanderthals’ and the modern humans’
weapons, may reveal deeper differences when it comes to potentials.
Neanderthals’ simplicity of weapons symbolizes the simplicity of thought.
You go inside the skull of Neanderthals and measure the volume of space
in their brains: actually they are bigger than ours. But when it comes to
brain it is not size that matters. When we look at the accomplishments of
Neanderthals it does not stalk up to the modern human’s standards, but
something was different about them. Before modern humans arrived in
Europe Neanderthals thrived unchallenged in their continent more than
100,000 years. But after contact with our species they disappeared within
few thousand years. Was it coincidence or conquest? Neanderthals
survived many extreme conditions for thousands of years. But they could
not withstand the invasion of the Cro-Magnon. Modern archaeological
evidence tells us that Neanderthals and Cro-Magnon shared the continent
of Europe for thousands of years before the Neanderthals died out. The
earliest modern Europeans, by carbon dating the skull 35,000 years ago
in Romania and the same time, late surviving Neanderthals in Southern
Iberia surviving 30,000 years ago that gives 5,000 years of overlap. The
overlap may be even longer than that, earliest bones found of Cro-Magnon
at least 35,000 years old. Artifacts like cave paintings, bone flutes,
sculptures that are linked to Homo sapiens, date back to 45,000 years
ago. But the Neanderthals’ artifacts don’t show these kinds of complicated
activities.
We know about Neanderthals about last hundreds of years. We tend
to think of them as ultimate cavemen, hairy, scary. However, they were
remarkable in their achievements and sophistication. They used fire, made
complex stone tools and weapons, wore clothing, and buried their dead.
They successfully adapted to harsh, cold climates of the late Ice Age and
survived as a species for more than 150,000 years, longer than modern
humans have existed. Now latest technology allows us to read their bones
more clearly and we are able to extract DNA and actually make sense of
it. New DNA test19 will give a clear picture of Neanderthals from hair to
hair color, a likelihood of Neanderthals’ inter-breeding with Homo sapiens.
19
DNA test is a method of identification that compares fragments of deoxyribonucleic
acid. It is sometimes called DNA typing. DNA is the genetic material found within the cell
nuclei of all living things. In mammals the strands of DNA are grouped into structures
called chromosomes. With the exception of identical twins, the complete DNA of each
individual is unique.
44
Is it Homo sapiens killed them off? Well experts don’t have indisputable
proof. The latest genetics and archaeological findings can serve us as a
guide to imagine more completely than ever before a possible scenario
in which these 2 distinct humans collide. Neanderthals were apparently
the sole humans in Europe when the first members of Homo sapiens
(Cro-Magnon) arrived there, probably from the Middle East, about 40,000
years ago. Around this same time, the Neanderthals are on the brink of a
different fate. They have been one of the most successful species in
human history, yet all their skill and toughness are not enough. As modern
humans begin to spread, they will inevitably come into contact. The
Neanderthals will be under pressure, and the imaginative newcomers
will squeeze them out. In evolution, you don’t have to fail to become
extinct, just succeed less often. Just over 10,000 years after the coming
of modern humans the Cro-Magnons, Neanderthals became extinct. Some
scientists theorize that competition for food or conflict with modern
humans played a role in the extinction of Neanderthals, but this is a subject
of debate. The exact reason for their disappearance remains a mystery.
Homo sapiens – (From 200,000 years ago and to Present)
And then there was us: Homo sapiens. Between 200,000 and 100,000
years ago, modern humans, Homo sapiens, evolved from Homo helmei in
Africa. Genetic evidence from examinations of both mitochondrial DNA
(from the female line) and Y chromosome DNA (from the male line) adds
support to the hypothesis that modern humans arose in Africa between
100,000 and 200,000 years ago. Modern humans reached Europe and,
via coastal routes, Indonesia and Australia, by around 50,000 to 60,000
years ago. Until recently, it was believed that modern human behavior,
characterized by the production of art, the burial of the dead and a
complex tool kit, was a relatively recent: European phenomenon
attributable only to Cro-Magnon man (an early type of H. sapiens) around
10,000 to 40,000 years ago. However, recent discoveries in Africa suggest
that the earliest evidence of all these ‘modern’ attributes can be found in
coastal sites in East Africa more than 100,000 years earlier. The first
anatomically modern human skull was found in Omo, Ethiopia, and is
dated to about 160,000 years old. Anatomically modern humans are
distinguished from their ancestors by having: a rounded skull, no thick
brow ridges and having a prominent chin. Touch your own head and see
if you can feel these features on your skull? Homo sapiens is the only living
species of human being. “Human” common name given to any individual
of the species “Homo sapiens” and by extension it is applied to the entire
45
species. The term is also applied to certain species that were the
evolutionary forerunners of Homo sapiens. Homo sapiens is identified,
for purposes of classification, as an animal (kingdom Animalia) with a
backbone (phylum Chordata) and segmented spinal cord (subphylum
Vertebrata) that suckles its young (class Mammalia); that is equipped
with five-digited extremities, a collarbone, and a single pair of mammary
glands on the chest (order Primates); and that has eyes at the front of the
head, stereoscopic vision, and a proportionately large brain (suborder
Anthropoidea). The species belongs to the family Hominidae, the extant
and extinct hominid forms constitute the family Hominidae.
Cro-Magnon – (40,000 to 10,000 years ago)
Cro-Magnons, who were prehistoric people who lived in Europe from
about 40,000 to 10,000 years ago. The Cro-Magnons were anatomically
modern people, and they are scientifically classified as “Homo sapiens”
just as are people today. They were the first modern humans to inhabit
Europe, living there at a time when glaciers covered much of the continent
and the climate was often bitterly cold. Cro-Magnons are named after the
Cro-Magnon rock shelter in Les Eyzies, southwestern France, where their
skeletal remains were first discovered in 1868. Like other modern humans,
Cro-Magnons had a high forehead, small brow ridges, and a well-defined
chin. These physical features set them apart from the Neanderthals. CroMagnon people first appeared in Europe about 40,000 years ago, probably
from the east and with an ultimate origin in Africa. By just under 30,000
years ago, the Cro-Magnons had entirely displaced the Neanderthals,
who had previously been the only human occupants of Europe.
Like the Neanderthals, the Cro-Magnons were hunters and gatherers,
who lived off the bounty of nature. Neanderthals and earlier humans had
skillfully made tools out of stone. The Cro-Magnons not only made an
unprecedented variety of stone tools, they also made tools and weapons
out of softer materials such as bone, ivory, and antler. In cultural and
technological sophistication, the Cro-Magnons far surpassed their
Neanderthal predecessors, leaving behind a dazzling output of symbolic
and decorative artifacts. By about 35,000 years ago, Cro-Magnons were
making sculptures of the finest quality. They played music on bone flutes
of surprisingly complex sound capability, and they unquestionably sang
and danced. They made notations on bone and antler plaques. They
buried their dead sometimes sumptuously, with elaborate grave goods.
They decorated the walls of caves with some of the most impressive
46
artwork ever made. Delicate, eyed bone needles dated 30,000 years ago
suggest they made fitted clothing. They even baked ceramic figurines
in simple but highly effective kilns. The Cro-Magnons, in a word, were us,
with language and all the complexities of symbolic thought. The origins
of the Cro-Magnons’ complex cognitive abilities, which they exhibited
virtually from the first moment of their occupation of Europe, are unknown.
The most ancient indications of complex symbolic behaviors come from
sites in Africa close to 100,000 years old, and the archaeological record
in between is very thin. Without question, the Cro-Magnons provide us
with the most dramatic evidence we have of the arrival of full-fledged
modern human sensibility. Of all the advances made by man, the invention
of a spoken language probably did the most to set him apart from every
other kind of animal. Yet, although language has played so vital a role in the
emergence of man, the actual processes by which it came into being remain
a total mystery. All one can say certainty is that language must have been
created in very gradual stages as men slowly enlarged their intellectual
powers, and that it, too, developed as part of the feedback process.
It’s now 30,000 years ago, and the final chapter of our human story
unfolds. Saved from the brink of extinction, the imaginations of our
ancestors have taken flight. They’ve created sophisticated language to
share their new ideas with each other, and they’re spreading across the
globe. Wherever they go, they’re leaving signs of the complex world
they’re creating as we witness in cave paintings. Who knows what these
images mean to him? We can only guess. They are the world inside the
artist’s head, made real. In a way, what they mean doesn’t matter. But the
fact they’re here at all, that someone crept into these caves and painted
something that only existed in their mind’s eye, is proof these people are
different from every other creature in the whole history of life. They’re
not simply living in caves, but in an imagined world of their own making.
Since our story began, our ancestors, like all animals have lived within the
confines of the world around them. But now, after seven million years of
evolution these people, and us have at last stepped outside the rules of
life. Soon, there will be only one species of two legged ape left on the
planet and all that modern humans have achieved is now possible.
Neolithic People: The First Farmers
Stone Age started 2.5 million years ago, also called as Lower Paleolithic.
Then Middle Paleolithic started around 200,000 years ago and Upper
Paleolithic started around 40,000 years ago. Then Mesolithic which started
47
around 10,000 years ago and ends at the beginning of Neolithic. The
latest period of the Stone Age is known as Neolithic, which runs between
about 9000 BC and 5000 BC, characterized by the development of settled
agriculture and the use of polished tools and weapons. The Neolithic
begins with the start of farming and ends with the beginning of the Iron
Age. Although stone tools were still in use, the Neolithic is characterized
by the development of agriculture and the making of polished stone
implements and establishment of semi-permanent villages, and the
practice of crafts such as weaving. The people kept domesticated animals
and grew crops which they supplemented with wild foods and game.
They developed a range of tools necessary for tending, harvesting,
processing and storing crops. There was growth in specialization, trade,
complex society and the making of elaborate burials. Stone and other
materials such as clay were used to make a wide variety of artifacts. As
humans make their way forward in time, shaping land, creating structures,
finding religions, pioneering arts and literature, weaving cultures, they
leave an everlasting mark on earth.
The cultural evolution of the Neolithic mind into that of the twentyfirst-century mind has come after the biologic evolution of the mammalian
brain into that of Homo sapiens. Over time ideas have become increasingly
prominent in human life. To understand the world rather than just survive
in it, about 150,000 years ago humans developed abstract language.
Four thousand years ago humans discovered writing, and finally, 900
years ago the Chinese and 560 years ago a European, Johannes
Guttenberg, discovered printing. The results of such cultural evolution
were spectacular. Planting times no longer needed to be remembered
in the mystical immanence of some Stonehenge solar observatory. With
the advent of printing, spring planting times could be relegated to the
aesthetically bland, but meticulously accurate, pages of farmers’ almanacs.
Emotions were not “fictional”; they were essential to survival.
For perhaps 100,000 years Homo sapiens were successful hunters
and gatherers, living in small bands, part of larger social and political
alliances. Their material worlds were surely limited, but their mythic worlds
undoubtedly were rich, and these treasures passed from generation to
generation. Then, between twenty thousand and ten thousand years ago,
people began to organize their practical lives differently, sometimes
exploiting plentiful food resources in a way that allowed less mobility,
more stability, perhaps more possessions. Finally, from ten thousand years
onward, food production, as against food gathering, became more
48
common, villages sprang up, small towns, cities, city-states, and eventually
nation-states. What we call civilization had arrived, founded on generations
of slow cultural changes. The range of practical, intellectual, and spiritual
possibilities nurtured by civilization is the ultimate expression of the
power of culture. These qualities we identify as defining humanity,
consciousness, compassion, morality, language emerged gradually during
our history. Surely it sets us apart from the rest of the species in the world.
And yet, if we look to the fossil record, we see the links in the chain that
binds us to the rest of nature.
Human Saga Written in DNA – Y Chromosome in Asia
We should understand some basic concepts that are involved in this
study. 1) Genetic Markers: Genetic markers are sequences of DNA that is
traced to specific locations on the chromosomes and associated with
specific traits. 2) Mutations: Mutations are changes in DNA sequence and
can be caused by errors that happen during DNA replication,
environmental conditions or diseases. 3) Mutation Rate: Scientists know
the rate at which mutations take place in a normal human being. So by
analyzing the DNA of a person scientists can predict very accurately the
sex of the person, the racial make up of the person, whether two people
are related and most importantly for the purpose of this study the age of
these markers (by using mutation rate). The idea of using mitochondrial
DNA (mtDNA)20 to provide dates was introduced in African genesis. The
first big study of the mtDNA of living humans in 1987 gave a picture that
appeared at the time to broadly match the fossil evidence. It showed
that the mtDNA of Africans had slightly more mutations, when compared
with other humans in the rest of the world, indicating that the African
lineage was a little older. The study also showed that there were only a
small number of differences between the mtDNA of all people sampled,
implying a short period of evolutionary history since the last common
ancestor of our own species, but also suggests that there was a small
initial population of Homo sapiens with a limited amount of genetic
variation. The more recent study places the age of the last common
20
Mitochondria or mtDNA are unusual organelles in that they contain
deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), typically found in the cell’s nucleus, and ribosomes, proteinproducing organelles abundant in the cytoplasm. Within the mitochondria, the DNA
directs the ribosomes to produce proteins, many of which function as enzymes, or
biological catalysts, in ATP production. The number of mitochondria in a cell depends
on the cell’s function. Cells with particularly heavy energy demands, such as muscle cells,
have more mitochondria than other cells.
49
ancestor at 143,000 years and 18,000. This date does not perfectly align
with dates from the fossil evidence, with finds of Homo sapiens from
Herto and Omo Kibish in Ethiopia being dated at up to 196,000 and
150,000 years old, respectively. If these dates are accurate, then
something very strange has occurred, for our species is about 200,000
years old but did not start to spread out of Africa and across the world
until 65,000 years ago, over 100,000 years after splitting from the last
common ancestor.
A further observation can be made from mtDNA studies. Periods of
population expansion or contraction leave their mark on DNA. Comparing
the same section of DNA from different individuals shows a number of
mismatches in the code. The frequency distribution of mismatches in
the code between individuals can be correlated with periods of
population change. High frequencies of mismatch indicate population
expansion. The evidence from the mtDNA of modern humans from
different geographical regions shows that there was a clearly defined
rapid expansion in the size of the African populations 80,000 years ago,
followed by rapid expansions in Asia and Europe 60,000 and 40,000
years ago. So it appears that a rapid rise in the African population was
followed by dispersal out of Africa and subsequent increases in the size
of populations in Asia and then Europe. Sex in mammals, including humans,
is determined by two chromosomes, called X and Y. Females have two X
chromosomes: males have one X and one Y. Some of the genes in a pair of
chromosomes will be swapped over during reproduction such that each
chromosome in the offspring is a mixture of paternal and maternal genes.
This process is called recombination. As there is only one Y chromosome,
paired with an X chromosome that is very different in size, recombination
in the Y chromosome is extremely limited and most of the 86 genes on it
never recombine. So, any group of mutations that occurs within these
genes remains stable, as a group, over long periods. According to the
recent single origin hypothesis,21 human ancestors originated in Africa, and
21
This means that all human mtDNA originated from a single ancestral lineage—
specifically, a single female—fairly recently and has been mutating ever since. Most
estimates of the mutation rate of mtDNA suggest that this female ancestor lived about
200,000 years ago. In addition, the mtDNA of African populations varies more than that
of peoples in other continents. This suggests that the mtDNA of African populations has
changed for a longer time than it has in populations of any other region, and that all
living people inherited their mtDNA from one woman in Africa, who is sometimes called
the Mitochondrial Eve. Some geneticists and anthropologists have concluded from this
evidence that modern humans originated in a small population in Africa and spread
from there.
50
eventually made their way out to the rest of the world. Analysis of the Y
chromosome is one of the methods used in tracing the history of early
humans. Thirteen genetic markers on the Y-chromosome differentiate
populations of human beings. It is believed, on the basis of genetic
evidence that all human beings in existence now descend from one
single man who lived in Africa about 60,000 years ago. The earliest groups
of humans are believed to find their present-day descendants among
the San people, a group that is now found in western southern Africa. The
San are smaller than the Bantu. They have lighter skins, more tightly curled
hair, and they share the epicanthal fold with the people of East Asia, such
as the Chinese and Japanese.
Southern and eastern Africa are believed to originally have been
populated by people akin to the San. Since that early time much of their
range has been taken over by the Bantu. Skeletal remains of these
ancestral people are found in Paleolithic sites in Somalia and Ethiopia.
There are also peoples in east Africa today who speak substantially
different languages that nevertheless share the archaic characteristics of
the San language, its distinctive repertoire of click and pop sounds. These
are the only languages in the entire world that use these sounds in speech.
As humans migrated out of Africa, they all carried a genetic feature on
the Y chromosome known as M168. The sequencing of the entire human
genome in the late nineties and DNA testing of people from every nook
and corner of the world (including India) is revealing a complex journey
undertaken by our ancestors that has largely remained a mystery to most
of us until now. Analyzing DNA and comparing DNA is something that has
been within the scientific realm for over 50 years. Comparing the data
manually is a slow and complicated process. But the growth in computing
power in the past few decades has changed all that. Sequencing human
genome and projects like the Genographic Project have ended once
and for all the question of the origins of modern human. Modern humans
originated in Africa. They lived in Africa for over 200,000 years before
they slowly but steadily started migrating out of Africa. They walked
along the coasts of Middle East and India and within a matter of 5000
years (of leaving Africa) they reached areas as far as Australia. The DNA of
every single human being on earth can be traced back to DNA of certain
human beings living in Africa today. It is also important to note that the
genetic diversity between two people in Africa is greater than the
diversity between a person in Africa and anywhere else in the world. This
is one of the proofs for the fact that human beings lived for a very long
period in Africa than outside the continent.
51
The first wave of migration out of Africa stayed close to the oceans
shores, tracing a band along the coastal areas of the Indian Ocean
including parts of the Arabian Peninsula, the Middle East, the Indian
subcontinent and into South East Asia, down into what is now Indonesia,
and eventually reaching Australia. This branch of the human family
developed an important new marker, M130. Why is the M130 gene marker
so important? M130 is a mutation that can be found on the Y chromosome.
The Y chromosome is responsible for male sex characteristics and certain
sections of it pass from father to son without any change. M130 is one of
the most ancient gene markers and is carried by descendents of the
African migrants. This first wave appears to have left dark-skinned people
along its path, including isolated groups of dark-skinned people in
Southeast Asia such as the aboriginal population of the Andaman Islands
(around 400 km off the west coast of Thailand), the Semang of Malaysia,
and the Aeta of the Philippines. The second wave of migration took a more
northerly course, splitting somewhere in the area around what is now
called Syria to sweep to interior Asia, where it split several more times in
Central Asia, north of Afghanistan. The lineages that flowed into Central
Asia carry M9. Other markers were added after the migration paths went
on in several different directions from Central Asia. The African diaspora
is believed to have begun some 50,000 years ago, long enough for many
changes to have occurred in humans remaining in Africa. The genetic
trends reported involve humans who left Africa, and their genetic histories.
The diversity found outside of Africa may well have been accentuated
since populations migrating to new hunting grounds would rarely have
had individuals moving backwards into previously settled regions. But
within Africa, isolation would have been geographically aided primarily
by the Sahara Desert, leaving people in areas not separated by the desert
to travel and migrate relatively freely.
Genetic Marker M168: An analysis of Y chromosomes from a large
sample of Africans and non-Africans showed that a particular mutation
called M168, had its origin in Africa. This marker first appeared
approximately 79,000 years ago and is found in every human being living
outside of Africa including India. The M168 marker mostly likely occurred
in modern day Ethiopia or Sudan. Three other more recent mutations
were identified in 163 Asian populations, all at the same site on the Y
chromosome and thus there are three subgroups or polymorphic forms
of the original m168 mutation, all ultimately tracing back to Africa. All the
Asian men studied had one of these three polymorphic forms of M168,
52
giving them a marker of their recent African ancestry. This strongly
suggests that the replacement model is correct. 22 The idea was some
sort of Replacement Theory. As science explains away most of the
mysteries in life, there is less and less need for a supernatural cause. Back
at our earliest point in history, there were people who had Gods for
everything: love, anger, war, peace, the sun and the moon, etc. At the
other end of the scale, our present point in time, there is a scientific
explanation for nearly everything. The time between these two points is
a gradual transition of replacement. If a man had been found without any
of these mutations then it would have suggested an ancient origin for his
Y chromosome that was outside Africa, but none of the 12,127 men tested
lacked the Africa marker. This evidence supports the replacement theory
for the colonization of Asia.
Genetic Marker M130 (M168-M130): Human beings carrying the M130
genetic marker are the first inhabitants of India. They walked along the
coast of Africa and on to India, Malaysia and Indonesia and finally ended
up in Australia almost 60,000 years ago. Less than 5% of Indian men have
this marker (most of them in places like Tamil Nadu and the Andaman and
Nicobar Islands). In contrast about 60% of Australian Aborigine men have
this genetic marker. Genetic Marker M20 (M168-M9-M20): The M20 genetic
marker is part of the M9 lineage. The M20 was very likely a Middle Eastern
marker. The group that carries this marker migrated into India in large numbers
(the haplogroup L that has this marker is known as the Indian clan). This
migration into India happened approximately 30,000 years ago. This marker
is found in large numbers among South Indians who speak the Dravidian
languages (Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada). In some South Indian
populations the frequency of this marker is as high as 50%. Genetic Marker
M17 (M168-M8-M173-M17: The M17 is one of the most controversial
markers as far as India is concerned. We have long known through oral
traditions and literature that people from Eastern Europe/Central Asia
migrated to India in our not so recent past (the Aryan invasion theory).
The replacement model of Christopher Stringer and Peter Andrews proposes that
modern humans evolved from archaic humans 200,000-150,000 years ago only in Africa
and then some of them migrated into the rest of the Old World replacing all of the
Neandertals and other late archaic humans beginning around 60,000-40,000 years ago.
If this interpretation of the fossil record is correct, all people today share a relatively
modern African ancestry. All other lines of humans that had descended from Homo
erectus presumably became extinct. From this view, the regional anatomical differences
that we see among humans today are recent developments—evolving mostly in the last
40,000 years. This hypothesis is also referred to as the “out of Africa”, “Noah’s ark” and
“African replacement” model.
22
53
The M17 marker found among certain Indians (including me) proves
once and for all that Europeans did migrate to India. But DNA cannot
prove whether these Europeans are indeed the Aryans that we talk about
or whether or not these European migrants were the cause of the decline
of the Indus Valley Civilization.
As some members of the M9 clan where migrating towards India
other members of the group headed north towards Central Asia and
Europe. From this group came the M173 marker which is the first large
wave of human migration to Europe. Most Europeans (and North
Americans) today can trace their DNA back to the M173 marker. For
some strange reason some members of the M173 group turned and
headed back towards South Asia (may be due to climatic conditions).
From this returning group comes the M17 Indo-European marker. The
M17 marker first appears about 15,000 years ago in Southern Russia/
Ukraine. The Indo-European languages including Sanskrit, Greek, Latin
and now English are closely linked to this group. It is highly likely that the
members of this group are the initial Indo-European language speakers.
It is estimated that over 35% of Hindi speaking males in India carry this
marker (compared to less than 10% among Dravidian language speakers).
The descendants of the first Indians still live in the Andaman Islands and
places like Tamil Nadu. People with the M20 marker and the Dravidian
languages are also still here (they arrived about 30,000 years ago) and
finally the Indo-European speakers (started with Sanskrit a language that
has origins in places like Ukraine) and their M17 markers are also present
(they arrived less than 5000 years ago). There are many more markers
present in India that shows migration into India and out of India. The
study of human migration and population genetics is a fascinating subject.
But this is just the beginning. But at least we now know who we “Indians”
really are.
Indian Adam and Indian Eve
What is the origin of Indians? Where did we get all those traits such as
straight air, slender figure, black eyes and brown color, which make us
uniquely Indian? That the saying in Tholkappiyam an ancient work on
Tamil Grammer, proclaims that the origin of Tamils was a period when
there were only rocks on earth and no sand “Kal Thontri Mann Thontra
Kalathu Valodu Mun Thontri Mootha kudi” is abundantly proved by the
fact that it was only in Tamil Country man appeared next to South Africa.
Isn’t a wonderful story? After the dispersion of Homo erectus out of Africa,
54
the main body of the people began to disperse eastward. As with other
early human migrations, it almost certainly wasn’t a conscious effort to
move from one place to another. Rather, it seems that the continuous belt
of steppe stretching across Eurasia provided as easy means of dispersal,
gradually following game further and further afield. It was during this
time that another marker appeared on the M89 lineage, given the name
M9. It was the descendents of M9, a man born perhaps 40,000 years ago
on the plains of Iran of southern central Asia, who were to expand their
range to the ends of the Earth over the next 30,000 years. We will call the
people carrying M9 the Eurasian clan. As the steppe hunters migrating
eastward, carrying Eurasian lineages into the interior of the continent,
they encountered the most significant geographical bollards so far. These
were the great mountain ranges that define the southern central Asian
highlands—the Hindu Kush running west to east, the Himalayas running
north-west to south-east and the Tien Shan running south-west to northeast. The three ranges meet in the center, at the so-called Pamir Knot in
present-day Tajikistan, and each radiates off like a spoke in a wheel.
The first humans to see them must have been absolutely awe-inspired.
Although they had encountered the Zagros range in western Iran, it was
a permeable barrier, with numerous valleys and low passes that would
have allowed easy movement. The Zagros themselves actually would
have been part of the geographic range of the prey species hunted by
Upper Paleolithic people, with the herds migrating into higher pastures
during the summer and descending to the surrounding plains in the
winter. The high mountains of central Asia were a different beast
altogether. Each of the ranges has peaks that soar to 5,000 meters or
higher (in case of the Tien Shan and Himalayas over 7,000 meters), and
the radiating high-altitude ridges would have been formidable barriers
to movement. Remember that the world was in the grip of the last ice
age, and temperatures would have been even more extreme than today.
It was because of these mountains that our Eurasian migrants would have
been split into two groups—one moving to the north of the Hindu Kush, the
other to the south, into Pakistan and the Indian subcontinent. How do we
know this? The Y-chromosome again traces the route.
Those who headed north, toward Central Asia, had additional mutations
on their Eurasian lineage that we will trace below. The Upper Paleolithic
people who headed south, though, had an unrelated mutation on their Ychromosome known as M20. It is not found at appreciable frequencies outside
of India—perhaps, one to two percent in some Middle Eastern populations. In
55
the subcontinent, though, around 50 percent of the men in southern India
have M20. This suggests that it marks the earliest significant settlement of
India, forming a uniquely Indian genetic substratum—which we can call the
Indian clan—that pre-dates later migrations from the north. The ancestors
of the Indian clan, who moved into southern India around 30,000 years
ago, would have encountered the earlier coastal migrants still living there.
From the genetic pattern, it seems likely that any admixture with them
was not reciprocal: as mitochondrial DNA retains strong evidence of the
coastal migrants in the form of haplogroup M, while the Y-chromosome
primarily shows evidence of later migrants from the north. Thinking back
to the scenario we imagined for the birth of the Upper Paleolithic in
Africa, this is the pattern we would expect to see if the invaders took
wives from the coastal population, but the coastal men were largely driven
away, killed, or simply not given the chance to reproduce. The result
would be the widespread introduction of M mtDNA lineages would not
be nearly as common—precisely the pattern we see. Today, the
frequency of the Coastal marker is only around 5 percent in southern
India, and it falls in frequency as we move northward. This pattern suggests
that the contribution from the coastal populations was minimal, at least
on the male side. The contrast between the two types of data gives us a
glimpse of the behavior of these first Indians, and hints at a cultural pattern
of today’s India.
The migrating Eurasian masses were not only shunted down into India,
of course—some of them also migrated to the north of the Hindu Kush,
into the heart of central Asia. The Tien Shan would have been an even
more formidable barrier than the Hindu Kush, keeping the Upper
Paleolithic hunters out of western China. It is around this time that another
mutation occurred on the Eurasian lineage. It was known as M45, and it
will help us to trace two very important later migrations. Using absolute
dating methods, we can infer that the M45 mutation occurred
approximately 35,000 years ago in central Asia. Today, M45 is found only
in central Asian and those who trace their ancestry to the region—thus, it
defines a central Asian clan. Descendants of the central Asian clan occur
only sporadically in the Middle East and East Asia, and at somewhat higher
frequency in India, where the clan appears to have migrated much later
(as revealed by the presence of additional mutations). The “ancestral”
form—the deepest split in the genealogy of Y-chromosomes from the
central Asian clan—is found only in central Asia. This allows us to pinpoint
the location of what is effectively a “regional Adam,” in much the same
56
way that the scientists identify our African Adam as being an ancestor of
the San Bushmen. The deepest branches in the M45 genealogy are found
today only in central Asia—not India, or Europe, or East Asia. Thus, M45
arose in central Asia. The limited distribution of the oldest descendants
of the central Asian clan suggests that the population where it arose was
isolated from people living in the surrounding parts of the continent.
While the Hindu Kush provides a ready explanation for why there was no
easy migratory path to India, it is not clear why this population had no
contact with groups living in the Middle East. After all, our Eurasian clan
had migrated into central Asia along this route—why couldn’t the central
Asian clan make the return trip? The inference is that another bollard had
entered the story, and given that it hadn’t been an insuperable barrier
several thousand years before when the central Asia clan’s ancestors first
migrated to the heart of the continent, it was likely to have appeared
after that first migration.
Today, the Dasht-e Kavir and Dasht-e Lut deserts of central Iran are
scorched, parched wastelands. The tiny population living there ekes out
a meager living using a highly developed system of agriculture, complete
with miles of underground irrigation channels known as “ghanats” that
have been in use for thousands of years. During the heat of the day the
residents of cities such as Yazd retire to subterranean chambers cooled
by wind channeled down long pipes, creating a haunting wail that can
be heard from miles away. It is inconceivable that anyone could survive
for long in this harsh climate without such a well-adapted lifestyle.
Hunting and gathering would be impossible—at least today. Similarly
the Karakum and Kyzylkum deserts of central Asia are harsh, desolate
places with very few inhabitants apart from a few nomadic shepherds.
There are, however, two belts of continuous steppe across the deserts of
central Iran, one to the north of the deserts, near the Caspian, and one to
the south, near the Arabian Gulf. When the world was in the midst of its
climatic schizophrenia around 40,000 years ago, it is likely that the
steppelands and deserts of Iran and central Asia went through periods
when the amount of moisture in the atmosphere would have been similar
to, or perhaps greater than, today. This could have been aided by changes
in the prevailing winds, bringing moisture in off the Arabian Sea. During
these relatively wet periods, which may have been brief, humans would
have been able to migrate fairly easily across the Iranian plateau and into
central Asia—again, the prey and hunting methods would be virtually
identical throughout the entire journey. We know that they did so because
57
of the genetic trail they left in their descendants, which traces a direct
path from the Levant to central Asia.
Once ice age reached a threshold temperature, though, there was a
significant decrease in precipitation and humidity as evaporation stalled
and water became frozen into the expanding ice sheets of the far north.
This seems to have happened between 40,000 and 20,000 years ago,
and it resulted in the creation of a new desert bollard on our route. The
continent was now split into northern, southern and western populations,
all headed into the coldest part of the ice age. The people living in India
and the Levant had the benefit of the sea, which served to mitigate the
effects of the increasingly cold and arid conditions. Those trapped north
of the Hindu Kush, however, had to adapt to the increasingly harsh lifestyle
of the Eurasian steppes—or die. It is likely that these early central Asians
would have stayed in the relatively warm environs of the southern steppes
had encroaching desertification not forced them on. Some stayed
behind, retreating into the foothills of the Hindu Kush where the water
supply from glacial melting, and the number of animals, were sufficient
for survival. Most, though, appear to have followed the migrating herds
of game to the north—into the face of the storm, as it were. It is likely that
they first reached Siberia during the early part of this period, around
40,000 years ago, when Upper Paleolithic tools make their appearance
in the Altai Mountains. The conditions would have been unimaginably
different from those their ancestors had left behind in Africa 10,000 years
before. Winter temperatures dropped to minus 40 degrees Celsius or
lower, and much of their time would have been spent hunting for food
and keeping warm. But the animals they hunted would have made the
difficulties worthwhile.
Human Beings Became the Story of God and Church
The official teaching of the Church recognized the value of the theory
of evolution only gradually. At first, like most Christian bodies, there was
a negative reaction. Scripture taught the creation of man by God directly
and evolution could not be reconciled with this belief. Gradually the
interpretation of Genesis favored a lessening of opposition to the theory
of evolution. In 1950, Pope Pius XII in “Humani Generis” allowed the
discussion of the possibility of evolution, but urged caution and reserved
the final decision to the official teaching office. In the text of the encyclical,
the Pope affirmed the immediate creation of the soul by God. In 1966, Pope
Paul VI addressed theologians gathered in Rome and offered greater
58
encouragement to the study of evolution and added the possible study
of the theories of monogenism and polygenism? The institutional Church
Monogenism and Polygenism
To treat of the origin of mankind also involves the scientific question of the origin
of the human race from one initial couple “monogenism” or the origin of the human
race from many couples “polygenism.” Adam was the presupposed father of the
whole human race with all people descending from him. Within a literal
interpretation of Genesis, this was the only possibility. Since the origin of the human
race is a subject for science and lies in the field of observation, what does presentday biology state with regard to human origins and how is this to be related to
theology? A major part of contemporary scientists hold to a doctrine of polygenism.
The transition from inferior forms to higher forms was made on a population level
and not on the level of individuals.
had gradually learned the value of the use of science in its theological
explanation, and from that encouragement various opinions have
developed that are based on evolution as a valid hypothesis.
The theory of evolution has clear consequences that affect Christian
anthropology. Theologians must respect science and preserve the
affirmation of Christian scripture and tradition. Only if the contemporary
theologian can maintain a relationship between science and theology
has he fulfilled his responsibility. Catholic theologians often seem to think
that the relationship between theology and evolution can be solved
according to the lines indicated in Human Generis, with the distinction
between body and soul: the body arose from pre-human organic matter,
with the soul directly created by God. The organic forms evolved to that
point at which time God created the spiritual soul, and so established the
first man. Such an explanation is not, however, acceptable. The Bible
affirms that man arose from the earth, not the body of man; moreover,
scripture affirms that man has a special relationship to God, and not just
his soul. A subtle form of dualism is always latent in such a theory; God is
concerned with the soul and so is theology: God is less concerned with
the body, and so the theologian gives the body of man to science. But
man is totally from the earth and is totally from God; there is no separation
in scripture.
Further difficulties evolve with regard to the action of God. When
the evolution of the human body is accepted and the immediate creation
of the soul by God is affirmed as bringing about the first man, how can
this intervention of God be understood? Such an explanation has God
59
intervening miraculously as a demiurge, rather than as the transcendent
God of Christian tradition. God has intervened in human history but always
in the context of salvation. It is no majestic enhancement to affirm that
God, intervened in the origin of mankind apart from his initial creative
act, nor, does the origin of individuals, after the initial presence of man on
this earth, by a similar action add much to the power of God. How can we
understand hominisation so that the activity of God is preserved and the
evolutionary theory is also affirmed as preserving human dignity and
divine power? Scripture presupposes the profound unity of man, which
is equally affirmed by the teaching office of the Church. There is no
teaching on the soul of man or the body of man. The distinction between
body and soul must be based on an understanding of the body as the
symbol of the soul and expressing the spiritual aspect of man. Any
explanation of man’s origin must be based on the affirmation that man is
from the earth and is unified. One possible theory depends on the meaning
of becoming, or transcendence, and the understanding of cause and
operation.
Becoming is not the same as change; becoming signifies a newness
of life or being that was not present previously; becoming is not superficial
and profoundly affects the totality of the being. Becoming involves an
overreaching, an extension of the being, a growth and development that
significantly alters the being through the addition of that which is new.
Examples clarify the difference between change and becoming. People
can change the color of their hair; it is a true change but is not a
development. Christianity can change its outward appearances, and not
at the same time effect a development. Becoming on a human level signifies
a newness that is present now which was not present before. A person has
undergone an attitudinal development and somehow it is the same
person, but also someone who has newness and richness that was not
present before. Maturity in life is a development, a becoming, and need
not be present even when the individual has gone through the accidental
changes of adolescence to adult life. To become more is to move from
one threshold to another level, while maintaining continuity with the
previous level of existence.
Becoming is possible because man is open to transcendence.
Everyone can be more than he is at any one moment in life; there is
always the possibility of knowing more, of loving more deeply, of going
beyond the limits of space and time and reaching out for the experience
of that which transcends space and time. The limits of man’s endurance
60
are unfathomable; the power of man’s spirit is still unknown; the
possibilities of any human life are still present as long as there is life.
Transcendence is not a passive quality of man; it is an active motion
based on man as spirit in the world. As long as man has spiritual qualities,
the material can never fully express the richness of those spiritual qualities
and spiritual powers. The body falls short of manifesting the expansiveness
of the human spirit; it is always possible to discover another way, another
medium through which the spiritual can be expressed. Nor can we ever
reach the point in believing that all of the possible expressions of spirit
have been exhausted. Becoming and human transcendence form the
basis for all of the creativity in life.
Transcendence need not be limited to human transcendence.
Infrahuman creatures do not have the reference to the totality of reality
as it does in man, but matter is never totally matter. There can be a
transcendence present in all creatures that is a transcendence of essence.
The world in evolution can be conceived as a world that is becoming
through the transcendence of itself. All of creation is striving to outdo
itself as it leaps forward with an excitement that adds ever-new
possibilities to the universe. Animals perform feats of marvel; plant life is
fascinating under close scrutiny; the most primitive forms of life capture
the attention of the lifetime of scientists. All of creation is in motion, as if
it’s going to somewhere and is adding to itself new possibilities and new
forms. The third element in the theory involves cause and operation. How
can we explain transcendence? There is the active transcendence in
which the creature operates and develops. But philosophy seeks an
explanation of this newness of being that results from self-transcendence.
Is it possible to conclude with more than what was present initially? If so,
how can this, be explained? The ultimate reason for creative
transcendence in the universe has to be related to the absolute infinite
cause, the power of God, which offers existence to all reality and sustains
the transcendence of creatures.
Traditional philosophy regarded God as the final cause of creation,
and as the efficient cause, as the one who began the operation and is
responsible for all that happens and precisely as it happens. We have
already seen that another possibility is open to us. Instead of conceiving
God as an efficient cause, it is proper to consider the transcendent God
as the transcendent cause who gives to creation the power to become, and
supports his creation and sustains his creation in its ever-developing
journey to perfection. God is the dynamic transcending cause who is truly
61
present to the universe, but who gives to the universe its own powers to
develop. The relationship between God as transcending cause and the
creature as transcending can be conceived as follows: the finite created
being can transcend itself only when the infinite cause pertains to the
constitution of the finite cause. The operation of the finite cause however
is able to transcend itself only when the finite cause is not an intrinsic
element of the created cause. Otherwise the created cause would have
already within itself what is becoming and would not experience
transcendence. The creature that is becoming through transcendence is
to be conceived as a cause to which the infinite reality of God pertains as
a constitutive element, but not that this reality of God becomes an intrinsic
element of the cause as such. The causality of God is not an operation on
the part of God that goes beyond the operation of the creature or which
does something that the creature does not do. It is the created reality
that actually transcends itself and adds a newness of being, but this is
possible only because the transcendent cause supports and sustains the
operations of the finite cause. God gives to his creation the power and
possibility of becoming more than it is and makes this possible because he
is present to this creation, not as efficient cause intervening but as
transcending cause supporting, sustaining, and encouraging.
Hominisation can be conceived as follows: in the origin of the first
man there was a becoming through the transcending of the infrahuman
organism to an organism endowed with spirit as self-consciousness. There
was a movement from consciousness to self-awareness that was the
passing of a threshold. This process was not the result of the proper powers
of the organism alone, but was truly the result of the powers of the
organism sustained by the transcending power of God. God acted through
the powers and possibilities that he has already given to his creation, God
created the first man, inasmuch as he supplied the secondary causes with the
possibility of transcending themselves. Nor was it a combination of partial
categorical causes such as principal and instrumental cause. The organism
itself was the total cause of the result through its power of transcendence,
just as God was the total cause present as transcendent cause.
This explanation has great advantages. It excludes a radical
evolutionism that denies all cooperation between God and man, and
excludes a totally materialistic approach to human origins. There is a
difference between matter and spirit that must be preserved. It also
renders the more moderate theory of evolution more intelligible and
maintains the unity of man. Man is totally from the Earth, but man is also
62
totally from God. Nor does the theory propose that spirit evolved from
matter. God as spirit is present in all of his creation and has given to his
creation the power to become more than what it is. The leap from
consciousness to self-consciousness is surely a dramatic development
but not nearly so dramatic, as the gift of God himself in grace, clearly
attested as part of Christian belief. The origin of mankind is the domain of
science as well as theology. In the previous explanation, the effort to
relate both disciplines can bring advantages to scientist and theologian.
To the believer, it offers a possible explanation that is in accord with a
more scientific approach to life. At the same time, it enhances the goodness
of God who has given to his creature the possibility of sharing in creative
activity by always calling and enticing man to become more than what he is,
and add a new richness to the already wonderful gift of life.
The Origin of the Individual
According to Christian faith, the individual man has immense value
because he is created in God’s image and is predestined to share in the
life of God. God refers to this man as person in dialogue, called to enter a
community with God. It is true that the individual, through the process of
generation, is inserted into the general biological context that will
determine his existence, but in this lies, the mystery of the origin of the
individual who is more than a moment in the flux of evolutionary forces.
For biology, the origin of the individual is casual and without great
significance. For Christian theology, the origin of the individual has a
destiny that surpasses his biological origin. When Christian theology
centered on the origin of the human soul, it was an effort to preserve this
profound value that is present in every individual. If today this theory is
reinterpreted, it includes the belief in the intrinsic value of the individual.
Traditional theology taught a theory of creationism to explain the origin
of the individual: God created the soul as the parents generated the
body. The theory preserves the value of the individual, as the individual
man has an immediate relationship to God and is of special value because
the soul is immediately created. The difficulty of the explanation is that
this intervention on the part of God does not really add to God’s power
and dignity and does not enhance man’s power to participate in the
creativity of God. The same objections to the general theory of the origin
of mankind are present in the origin of the individual through the direct
creation of the soul by God.
63
Becoming, based on human transcendence supported by God as
transcendent cause, can adequately explain the origin of the individual
and preserve the unique value of the person. There is no great difference
between the question of hominisation of man in general and the origin of
the individual. Both involve becoming and transcendence. In the origin
of the individual, however, it is not a question of the infrahuman to the
human, but a transcendence of the human couple. Parents in the act of
generation truly transcend themselves, add a newness of being, express
their love for each other in a physical way, and in more than just a physical
way. We conclude that the parents are responsible for the child and not
just for the body of the child; it is their flesh and blood and it is the
individual who is endowed with spirit that is the result of their union.
Whatever is the result belongs properly to them. It is equally true that
God is responsible for the child and not just for the soul. As transcendent
cause, he has supported and sustained and encouraged the parents to
express themselves in love and transcend their own existence by the
presence of new life. Together God and parents create the great gift of
human life. Whatever the religious assumptions attempt to teach on the
origin of man, there are still some scientific explanations pending, we
still have to explain the similarities between the human and animal
kingdom. Human development is still underway. Hence science classifies
man under animal kingdom: the kingdom of Animalia—one of the 5
kingdoms of life—the other 4 are; the kingdom of Monera, the kingdom
of Protista, the kingdom of Fungi, the kingdom of Plants. With all that
human hubris which religions inflate, we are just part of animal kingdom.
In other words, we’re more related to animal than human, and in the
following treatment, I’m going to show some remarkable similarities found
in man and great apes, our nearest relatives.
Great Apes – Our Nearest Relatives
Apes are not monkeys. Apes are larger, have fewer young and spend
a longer time raising them, spend more time upright, and depend more
on their eyes than on their noses. And unlike monkeys, apes do not have
tails. But the most important difference is that apes are more intelligent
than monkeys. Their brains are larger and more developed, and apes can
learn and pass along information. They already use basic tools, have
rudimentary language and star in TV commercials, but now scientists
have proof that chimpanzees are more closely related to humans than
other great apes. Genetic tests comparing DNA from humans, chimps,
64
gorillas and orangutans reveal striking similarities in the way chimps and
humans evolve that set them apart from the others. The great apes belong
to the taxonomic family Homindae, which includes chimpanzees, bonobos,
orangutans, and gorillas. This group includes our closest wild relatives. In
fact, all members of this family share possibly more than 97% of their
DNA. Some scientists think that humans should be considered great apes,
too. Chimpanzees share more genetic material with humans—about
99%—than they do with gorillas. The great apes have all been
documented using tools, and communicating with amazing complexity.
The great apes are found primarily in Central Africa with the exception of
orangutans, which are native to the islands of Borneo and Sumatra in Asia.
All of the great apes face serious threats and are all endangered, some
critically endangered. Habitat loss, climate change, infectious disease
and illegal hunting for both meat and the live pet trade have combined
to push these species to the brink of extinction. If we don’t act soon, we
will lose our closest relatives forever.
Some animal babies are on their own from the moment they are born.
But great apes are born helpless and must be carefully nurtured by their
mothers. In its first few years an infant great ape is always with its mother,
and most remain close for years afterward. A young great ape must spend
years learning about the world and how to behave in its community.
After all, it will be part of a community for 30 to 50 years. Apes’ hands are
prehensile, capable of grasping things, and so are their feet. Like us, apes
have flat fingernails and complicated fingerprints. But unlike us, their
bodies are designed to be most comfortable walking on all fours. Apes
have arms longer than their legs, and walk on the knuckles of their hands.
What makes the great apes so fascinating? Maybe it’s because they remind
us of ourselves. Often they use gestures and facial expressions that look
much like ours—but in fact these may have a very different meaning. For
example, what looks like a big smile on a chimpanzee may be a “fear
grin” that means it is scared. Researchers have taught a kind of signed
language to great apes in captivity. All four kinds of great apes have
been able to learn it, though none use it in the wild. Koko, a famous
gorilla, uses about 1,000 signs. None of the apes can speak as we do,
though, because their vocal cords are different.
Chromosomes Between Humans and Apes
Darwin created a public furor by suggesting that we evolved from
apes, but he lacked the scientific tools to prove how right he really was.
65
In 1970, molecular biologists developed a test to accurately determine
the percentage of difference between one species’ genetic code and
another. By 1973, ornithologists Charles Sibley and Jan Ahlquist were
applying that test on a mass scale to help them in bird taxonomy. It
wasn’t until the early 1980s that they applied the test to humans and our
nearest relatives. When the results were published in 1984, even Darwin
would have been shocked. We are 98.4 percent identical in our genes to
chimpanzees. We are closer to chimps than chimps are to gorillas. Only
our pride has so far kept us from making the adjustment required by the
rules of zoological nomenclature to include the other two species of
chimpanzee in the genus Homo. All great apes apart from man have 24
pairs of chromosomes. There is therefore a hypothesis that the common
ancestor of all great apes had 24 pairs of chromosomes and that the
fusion of two of the ancestor’s chromosomes created chromosome 2 in
humans. The evidence for this hypothesis is very strong. Molecular studies
indicate that chimpanzee and gorilla are the closest relatives of man. The
small molecular distances found point to late ancestral separations, with
the most recent being between chimpanzee and man, as judged by
DNA hybridization. Kluge and Schwartz contest these conclusions:
morphological characters group a “chimpanzee, gorilla clade” with the
Asian ape orangutan in Kluge’s cladistic study and with an “orangutan,
human clade” in Schwartz’s study. Clearly, extensive sequencing of
nuclear DNA is needed to resolve by cladistic analysis the branching
order within Hominoidea. Towards this goal, we are sequencing
orthologues of the primate-globin locus. Here, we compare the newly
completed sequences of orangutan and rhesus monkey with human,
chimpanzee, gorilla, owl monkey, lemur and goat orthologues. Our findings
substantially increase the evidence indicative of a human ”chimpanzee”
gorilla clade with ancestral separations around 8 to 6 myr ago. We also
verify that neutral hominoid DNA evolved at markedly retarded rates.
In the case of the striking similarities between human and chimp
genomes, by far the simplest explanation anybody has ever proposed is
that humans and chimps share a common ancestor, and a fairly recent
one at that. Because nobody has ever produced compelling evidence
that this explanation is wrong, it is the one that scientists tentatively accept.
If such evidence were to emerge, then scientists would look to modify
the explanation. We could always come up with all kinds of fantastic
explanations. As a rule, scientists work with the simplest explanations
66
first, because simple explanations require us to make few assumptions.
This principle is known as “Occam’s Razor.” For the same reasons, scientists
O c c a m ’s R a z o r
Occam’s (or Ockham’s) razor is a principle attributed to the 14th century logician
and Franciscan friar William of Ockham. Ockham was the village in the English county
of Surrey where he was born. The simplest explanation is usually the right one.
Detectives use it to deduce who’s the likeliest suspect in a murder case—you know,
the butler did it. Doctors -use it to determine the illness behind a set of symptoms.
This line of reasoning is called Occam’s razor. It’s used in a wide variety of ways
throughout the world as a means to slice through a problem or situation and
eliminate unnecessary elements. Taken together, they represent the basis of
humanity’s investigation into the universe, and the way we see our environment is
largely based upon Occam’s razor. There’s no telling what kind of world we would
live in today without Occam’s razor. Would we have the Internet? Would we have
inoculations?
always look for explanations that are based on natural, observable, testable
phenomena. Now that both the human and chimpanzee genomes have
been sequenced, comparing the sequences of these chromosomes
provides even better evidence of this. I know that humans have 46 and
chimps have 48. In other words human beings have 23 pairs of
chromosomes and apes have 24 pairs. Taxonomists believe that a common
ancestor of apes and humans had 24 pairs of chromosomes. As humans
and apes evolved along different lines, the two smallest ape
chromosomes were combined into a single, larger human chromosome.
Evidence suggests that humans evolved from a common ancestor of
apes and human by the fusion of two pairs of chromosomes that reduced
the chromosome number from 48 to 46. How this happened is not known.
Most ape and human chromosomes are identical. The 9th and the 14th
ape chromosomes, when combined, are like a palindrome of the human
12th chromosome. That is, when viewed on a chromatic scale, if the ape
chromosomes (9 + 14) are joined and flipped over, the result would look
just like the human #12 chromosome. That’s what makes apes so
genetically close to human beings, despite the difference in the number
of chromosomes.
Sometimes apes use simple tools, also capable of language and they
star in Hollywood Movies, but now scientists have proof that chimpanzees
are more closely related to humans than other great apes. Genetic tests
comparing DNA from humans, chimps, gorillas and orangutans reveal
67
striking similarities in the way chimps and humans evolve that set them
apart from the others. The finding adds weight to a controversial proposal
to scrap the long-used chimp genus “Pan” and reclassify the animals as
The Genus Pan
A new study of Y-chromosome variation has shed fresh light on the population
history of the genus Pan, which includes our closest living relatives, bonobos and
chimpanzees. The study confirms a great diversity in both species and suggests
these species have substantially larger effective population sizes than humans. Ychromosome lineages appear distinct between bonobos and chimpanzees, and
also between the different chimpanzee subspecies. During the Pleistocene, forest
fragmentation led to recurrent, transient subdivisions within regional Pan
subspecies; did these contribute to their apparently higher effective population
sizes?A paternal view of apes and humans: Y-chromosome diversity points to
different and more ancient population histories in the Great Apes than were
indicated by mitochondrial and autosomal DNA.
members of the human family. The move would give chimps a new place
in creation’s pecking order alongside humans, the only survivor of the
genus Homo. The biologist Soojin Yi’s team at Georgia Institute of
Technology in Atlanta compared 63m base pairs of DNA from different
species, where each base is a letter in the animal’s genetic code. They
then analyzed the DNA to look at what evolutionary biologists call the
molecular clock, the rate at which an animal’s genetic code evolves. The
speed of the clock shows how the span of a generation has changed
over the millennia. The tests showed that even though humans and chimps
split from a common ancestor between 5m and 7m years ago, the rate at
which their genetic codes were evolving was extremely similar, differing
by only 3%, and much slower than gorillas and orangutans. A slow
molecular clock suggests that the time between generations is long,
something that has historically set humans apart from the great apes.
Team member Navin Elango said: “We found that the chimpanzee’s
generation time is a lot closer to that of humans than it is to other apes.”
According to the scientists, whose study published in the US journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the finding suggests
some human traits only emerged 1m years ago, a fleeting moment on
evolutionary scales. “This study provides further support for the hypothesis
that humans and chimpanzees should be in one genus, rather than in two
different genera, because we not only share extremely similar genomes, we
share similar generation time,” said Dr. 0 Yi. Doubts over the chimp’s
68
position in the evolutionary tree have been around from the start. In
1775, when scientists first got around to naming the chimpanzee, they
noted the similarity with people and placed them next to humans under
the genus Homo. But by 1816 chimps had been pushed out into their
own genus, Pan, which has survived to this day.
Orangutan – 97% Human DNA
Pongo pygmaeus is species that dwell in Borneo Island, and Pongo
abelii is species that dwell in Sumatra. They are the only surviving species
in the genus Pongo. We simply call them orangutan. It was taken from the
words “orang” (man) and “hutan” (forest). Physically, they really resemble
human (of the forest). They are the most intelligent primates in the world,
beside their African cousin chimpanzee. Unlike gorillas and chimpanzees,
orangutans are not the knuckle-walkers. They walk by shuffling on their
palms with their fingers curved inwards. Their fingers and toes are curved,
allowing them to better grip onto branches. In addition, the arms of an
orangutan are twice longer than their legs. It makes orangutan the most
arboreal of the great apes. They’re spending nearly all of their live in the
trees. Every night they fashion nests, in which they sleep, from branches
and foliage. Orangutans are more solitary than the other apes, with males
and females generally coming together only to mate. The females can
grow to around 1.27 meters and weigh around 45 kg, while males can
reach 1.75 meters in height and weigh over 118 kg. With those long
brown hairs, I must say orangutans are the ugliest ape I’ve ever seen.
However, their population has recently been decreasing. That’s sad.
Orangutans as the ancestor of great apes in Asia have been living
since two or three million years ago, along the Himalaya mountain range.
That means they’ve been existed far away from human existence. But
then the climate change and the sea surface’s heighten made them
separate to many forests. They spread from South to Southeast Asia,
especially when the islands of Sumatra, Java and Borneo had unified to
one big land. Mostly, those orangutans concentrated all along the main
rivers and foot of mountains. They had been living in pleasant with plenty
of food resource inside. Fruit makes up 65% of the orangutan diet. Those
with sugary or fatty pulp are favored. The other food items include young
leaves, shoots, seeds, also insects and bird eggs. Like the other great
apes, orangutans are remarkably intelligent. But orangutans are different.
They have shown laughter-like vocalizations in response to physical
contact, e.g. wrestling, play chasing, or tickling. And they practice some
culture.
69
At least, that was uttered by Meredith L Bastian. This young researcher
from Anthropology Biology and Anatomy of Duke University has been
researching the wild Pongo pygmaeus wurmbii in Central Borneo province.
Meredith found that orangutans in Tuanan River speak each other in the
sound and tones like a kiss voice. In the meantime, Lading River’s
orangutan sounds like “tac-tic-toc” at the same effort. Orangutans also
kiss and hug each other to express the high level of love and affection.
And, “When it rained or the sun was too intense, orangutans would seek
out a wide leaves to shelter their head.” This finding fits out the previous
study done by Carel van Schaik, a Dutch primatologist from the same
university. He found orangutans are capable of tasks well beyond
chimpanzees’ abilities, such as using leaves to make rain hats and leakproof
roofs over their sleeping nests. Carel also found that in some food-rich
areas, orangutans had developed a complex culture in which the adults
would teach their juniors how to make tools and find food. Sumatran
orangutans are acquainted with tools for cracking the solid-peeled fruits.
According to Meredith, if we maintain orangutan’s habitats well and keep
away the individuals from any (human) threat, it’s not impossible for
orangutans to perfect their “culture”. Unfortunately, here, we always have
the problem with hunting and illegal pet trade. About 100 Bornean
orangutans took away to Thailand in early 2004, for instance. Meanwhile,
orangutan habitats have been in destruction because of logging, mining
and forest conflagrations. But the major problem for now has been the
conversion of huge areas of tropical forest to oil palm plantations in
response to international demand. As consequence, the population of
orangutans hasn’t been well protected and their future looks very grim.
Gorilla – 98% Human DNA
Few animals have sparked the imagination of man as much as the
gorilla, the largest of the great apes is among our most endangered
species. The only natural enemy of gorillas has always been human beings.
Most gorillas live in inaccessible regions in various dense forests in tropical
Africa, and one subspecies, the mountain gorilla (Gorilla beringei beringei),
was not even known to science until 1902. The mountain gorilla has a
robust build with long, muscular arms, a massive chest, and broad hands
and feet. It is the hairiest race of gorillas; its long, thick black hair insulates
it from the cold of living at high elevations. Gorillas are still hunted for
meat (bushmeat) and trophies in some parts of Africa, and they are caught
in traps set for other animals. In the past, whenever an infant gorilla was
captured for a zoo, the mother and often the other members of the family
70
were killed as they defended the baby. Now the most serious threat to
free-living gorillas is the human population explosion. As more and more
people take over the land for agriculture, logging and other development,
the gorillas have nowhere left to go. The world’s remaining mountain
gorillas live within four national parks, split in two regions that are 45
kilometers (28 miles) apart. One population of mountain gorillas inhabits
the Bwindi Impenetrable National Park in Uganda. A census in 2006
recorded 302 gorillas here. The second population of mountain gorillas is
found in a mountainous region referred to as the Virungas, which includes
Mgahinga Gorilla National Park (Uganda), Volcanoes National Park
(Rwanda) and Virunga National Park (Democratic Republic of Congo). A
census conducted in 2010 showed 480 gorillas live in the Virungas.
Although strong and powerful, gorillas are generally gentle and shy.
They live in groups of 2-40 individuals, averaging about 11. Groups are
led by a dominant male, the silverback, named for the silvery gray hairs
that grow when the male matures. The silverback serves as the chief
leader and protector of the group, to whom all group members defer. He
decides when and where to forage, rest and sleep, arbitrates disputes
among his family members and protects them from rival silverbacks or
human predators. Mountain gorillas have a slow rate of reproduction. This
slow reproduction makes this species even more threatened. In a 40-50
year lifetime, a female might have only 2-6 living offspring. Females
give birth for the first time at about age 10 and will have offspring every
four years or more. A male reaches sexual maturity between 10 and 12
years. Able to conceive for only about three days each month the female
produces a single young and in rare cases twins. Newborn gorillas are
weak and tiny, weighing about 4 pounds. Their movements are as awkward
as those of human infants, but their development is roughly twice as fast.
At 3 or 4 months, the gorilla infant can sit upright and can stand with
support soon after. It suckles regularly for about a year and is gradually
weaned at about 3.5 years, when it becomes more independent.
I really love it when I have good news to share. The recent find of a
large population of lowland gorillas in the Republic of the Congo, alive
and totally thriving, is to my eyes a great find indeed! The Wildlife
Conservation Society released a recent census which has astounding
numbers. According to the new census, they have tallied more than
125,000 of these elusive gorillas in two adjacent areas in the northern
part of the country, covering an area of 18,000 square miles (47,000
square kilometers). It is said that previous estimates from the 1980s placed
71
the entire population of western lowland gorillas, which occur in seven
Central African nations, at less than 100,000. However, according to
popular belief, scientists had believed that this number had at least
halved, due to hunting and disease. WCS says a combination of factors
led to such high numbers of gorillas including: successful long-term
conservation management of the Republic of Congo’s protected areas;
remoteness and inaccessibility of some of the key locations where the
gorillas were found; and a food-rich habitat, particularly in some of the
swamp forests and the herb-rich “Marantaceae” forests.
While this is excellent news indeed, now we need to work fast to
make sure protections are put in place for these precious creatures. There
is always the danger of potential deforestation as well as illegal poaching,
now that this discovery has been made public. Across Central Africa,
gorillas face the looming threats of hunting for bushmeat and the spread
of the Ebola virus, which is lethal to gorillas as well as humans. WCS is
working with partners to combat Ebola, eliminate commercial hunting,
and secure this last stronghold for Africa’s apes. WCS cautioned that many
of the gorillas live outside of existing protected areas, though the
Government of Congo has committed to creating a new national park in
the Ntokou-Pikounda region. Let’s just hope folks sit up and listen, and
realize how important it is for us to protect our wildlife and wild places,
for the resources they provide in the long term are so very precious.
Nature provides so many treasures and as stewards of this planet we
must preserve the green world and the wild creatures who help create
the balance.
Bonobo – 98% Human DNA
It is difficult to answer the question: “What is a Bonobo?” Bonobos are
complex beings with profound intelligence, emotionality, and sensitivity.
It’s like asking the question: “What is a human?” And, how do you answer?
Philosophers, scientists, and mystics have been trying to figure it out for
thousands of years! Bonobos are great apes, along with chimpanzees,
orangutans, and gorillas. Because we share so many characteristics with
these simian species, some scientists contend that humans should be
classified as apes too. Bonobos stand apart from the other great apes in
fascinating and important ways. Physically, their anatomy most closely
resembles Australopithecus, our early human ancestor. Bonobos walk
bipedally, on two feet, more easily and for longer periods of time than
the other apes. They are highly intelligent. Some bonobos in captivity
72
have even learned to use human language! But perhaps the most
compelling feature of bonobos is their society. Indigenous people who
have dwelled among bonobos in the Congo forest have many legends
about how bonobos and man were brothers in the distant past. They tell
stories about how bonobos showed people what foods to eat in the forest,
how a bonobo saved a man who needed help, and how bonobos
themselves are trying to become human. Biologically speaking, bonobos
are the closest you can get to being human without being human.
Bonobos look more like humans than other apes, and display many
behavioral similarities as well. Bonobos and people share more than 98%
of the same genetic make-up (DNA). Bonobos and their cousins the
chimpanzees are more closely related genetically to us than they are to
gorillas! But, like gorillas, they dwell only in the equatorial forests of central
Africa, the cradle of humanity itself.
Cradle of Humanity – Mother India, Indeed
Who were the first Indians? And where did they come from? Non recombinant Y
chromosome is a stable region of our genome and it is a time machine: the genetic
and migration history of a man is imprinted in this part of the genome and one can
identify the migration route, lineages and determine the time of origin using
maximum parsimony and other similar methods. The study identified two major
waves of migration out of Africa: first a coastal migration 50,000 years ago and
the second migration to Central Asia, 45,000 years ago. The second migration
expanded in Central Asia lead dispersal towards Europe, Americas, south Asia and
China. In his book, ‘Journey of Man’: “all of us are literally Africans underneath the
skin, brothers and sisters separated by mere 2000 generations,” thus concluded
Spencer Wells, the scientist from Oxford, narrating the ‘Journey of Man’ in his
National Geographic Channel International exclusive telecasted on 15th
December and 18th December 2002 in India and thereafter all over the world. As
Luca Cavalli Sforza, father of human population genetics from Stanford says
‘Genetics is the biological history’ and it has traced the migration of man around
the world. Geneticists from the Madurai Kamaraj University in Southern India,
headed by Dr. RM. Pitchappan, claim they have found the answers in a small village
called Jyothimanickam on the fringes of the Western Ghats, some 50 km from
Madurai. Thirteen people in this hamlet carry the gene ‘M130’ in their DNAs and
researchers from the university claim their ancestors were the first ‘Indians.’ Prof.
RM. Pitchappan, Senior Professor & Head, Department of Immunology, School of
Biological Sciences played a crucial role in this discovery, identifying the first
coastal migration of modern man (Homo sapiens) from Africa to Australia, through
India, 50,000 years ago. Pitchappan and his team first found the gene marker
‘M130’ in a person called Virumandi when they tested the DNA of some tribal
73
villagers to get clues about human migrational history. Pitchappan studied three
‘breeding isolates’ (castes) of Tamil Nadu in southern India, viz. Piramalai Kallars,
Yadhavas and Sourashtrans and had big surprises. All these people living now in
Madurai possessed 5-7% M130 marker. The Piramalai Kallars and Yadhavas studied
by Pitchappan may represent earlier Dravidian populations (30,000-10,000 yrs
old isolates). Cambridge scholars have suggested that Dravidian language was
spoken first in Fertile Crescent and spread to Middle East and the whole of India
some 10,000 years ago. The findings also serve as strong evidence that the rest of
the world may have been populated from India. There is already a growing view
among geneticists that South Asians populated the rest of world. Central Asia is
said to be the most important reservoir of genetic diversity, and the source of at
least three major waves of migration leading into Europe, the Americas and India.
In contrast to the competitive, male-dominated culture of their close
relative the chimpanzee, bonobo society is peaceful, matriarchal and
more egalitarian. Bonobos live in large groups where harmonious
coexistence is the norm. While in many ways, males and females have
“separate but equal” roles, females carry the highest rank, and the sons of
ranking females are the leaders among males. Females form close bonds
and alliances, which is another way they maintain their power among
males, who are larger and stronger physically. Like chimps, bonobo society
is “male philopatric,” meaning that the females migrate to other groups
when they reach puberty. This eliminates the chance of incest and
increases genetic diversity. Bonobos seem to ascribe to the 1960s hippie
credo, “make love, not war.” They make a lot of love, and do so in every
conceivable fashion. Beyond that, they are very loving too, showing care
and compassion for each other in many ways. Sex in bonobo society
transcends reproduction, as it does in humans. It serves as a way of
bonding, exchanging energy and sharing pleasure. Bonobos have been
described as “pansexual” by psychologist Frans de Waal. Sex permeates
the fabric of bonobo society, weaving through all aspects of daily life. It
serves an important function in keeping the society together, maintaining
peaceful, cooperative relations. Besides heterosexual contact, both male
and female bonobos engage in same-sex encounters, and even group
sex occurs. Female-female contact, or “GG-rubbing,” is actually the most
common. Unlike other apes, bonobos frequently copulate face-to-face,
looking into each others eyes. When bonobo groups meet in the forest,
they greet each other, bond sexually, and share food instead of fighting.
Likewise, almost any conflict between bonobos is eased by sexual activity,
grooming, or sharing food.
74
Like humans, bonobo females are sexually receptive throughout most
of their estrus cycle. Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes), on the other hand,
only mate during the few days when a female is fertile. Generally, the
ranking males in chimp society “get the girls.” Male chimps make macho
displays to impress females and can be quite vehement in their demands.
Consequently, chimp females do not have much control over who they
mate with. Bonobo males tend to be a bit more polite. They ask first, by
displaying themselves in a persuasive but non-aggressive manner, offering
food or making other propositions—and bonobo females have the right
to refuse. The sexual aspect of bonobo behavior is best understood in the
context of bonobo culture. Sex does not necessarily mean the same thing
to a bonobo that it does to a human. However, it raises compelling
questions about the roots of human nature, and is particularly striking in
contrast to chimpanzee society. Scholars continue to study this unique
phenomenon and debate its implications. What’s it like to come upon a
group of bonobos in the forest? First of all, you’d better look up! Bonobos
spend a lot of time high in the rainforest canopy. These acrobatic apes
move through the trees swiftly and gracefully, maneuvering through the
forest to forage on fruit and other foods. They also travel on the ground,
often single file along their own sort of trail system. They tend to like
swampy areas, where sometimes they dig for grubs or small crustaceons.
Bonobos have complex mind maps of the forest and coordinate travel
through vocalizations and other forms of communication people do not
yet understand.
Bonobos live in groups of up to 100, breaking up into foraging groups
by day and gathering to nest at night, in a fission-fusion modality. When
bonobos gather in the trees to make their night nests, they fill the twilight
with a symphony of soprano squeals. Their high-pitched vocalizations
sound like a flock of exotic birds, compared to the more gutteral hoots of
chimpanzees. Bonobos eat a variety of foods, including fruits, nuts, seeds,
sprouts, vegetation, and mushrooms. They eat various parts of plants,
including the leaves, flowers, bark, stems, pith, and roots. They also eat
small mammals, insect larvae, earthworms, honey, eggs, and soil. Unlike
chimpanzees who form hunting parties to capture monkeys, bonobos do
not aggressively hunt mammals. On rare occasions, they have been
observed to capture duikers (small antelope) or flying squirrels, but this
seems to be circumstantial. Bonobos do forage for “mbindjos,” or
caterpillars, the larvae of various butterfly species. Mbindjos are also
collected and eaten by local villagers who share the forest with bonobos.
75
In fact, indigenous people of the Congo Basin and bonobos eat many of
the same foods.
These apes have fascinated indigenous people of Africa for hundreds,
even thousands of years, yet to most of the world’s population, they have
been known to exist only for the span of one lifetime. Bonobos were not
discovered by scientists until 1933, and even then, not alive, but in the
Tervuren Museum in Belgium, identified by means of a skull. Classified as
Pan paniscus, bonobos have been studied in the wild and in captivity for
about 30 years, since the mid-1970s. They dwell in the tropical forests of
the Congo Basin south of the Congo River. Bonobos are found in only one
country: the Democratic Republic of Congo (former Zaire), a resourcerich region ravaged by years of war. Although more research is needed
to determine current populations, we do know that their numbers have
been decimated during the war. However, the wild bonobo population
is so fragmented now in the Congo, with small groups living in isolated
pockets, that the sustainability of the species is severely threatened. It
will be critical for us to establish protected areas and corridors to provide
for genetic viability of the species. However, bonobos share a human
landscape, and our work with indigenous Congolese people is an
important aspect of bonobo conservation. Urgent help is needed.
Chimpanzee – 99% Human DNA
When Jane Goodall first observed wild chimpanzees hunting and
eating meat nearly 40 years ago, skeptics suggested that their behavior
was aberrant and that the amount of meat eaten was trivial. In the early
1960’s, when Dr. Jane Goodall began her now famous study of the
chimpanzees of Gombe National Park, Tanzania it was thought that
chimpanzees were strictly vegetarian. In fact, when Goodall first reported
this behavior, many people were skeptical and claimed that meat was
not a natural part of the chimpanzee diet. Throughout her years of
research, Jane Goodall has noted that the Gombe chimpanzees tend to
go on “hunting crazes,” during which they would hunt almost daily and
kill large numbers of monkeys and other prey (Goodall 1986). The
explanation for such binges has always been unclear. Today, we know
that chimpanzees everywhere eat mainly fruit, but are also predators in
their forest ecosystems. The Chimpanzee and its relative the Bonobo are
more closely related to humans than to any other ape. Chimpanzee
communities number from 20 to 105 apes, but group members will
76
wander alone or in small parties searching for food. They will travel on
the ground between trees and bed down wherever darkness overtakes
them. When they do assemble in larger parties, it is to share a food source
like a fig tree in fruit. The discovery that chimpanzees used “tools”
surprised the world. Their use of sticks to collect ants and termites from
their nests and rocks to smash open nuts gave scientists proof that not
only humans use cognitive thinking to problem-solve.
Chimps are mainly found in rain forests and wet savannas. While they
spend equal time on land and in trees, they do most of their feeding and
sleeping in trees. We know that the earliest upright-walking (bipedal)
hominids, the australopithecines, evolved in Africa about 5 million years
ago, and that they shared a common ancestor with modern chimpanzees
shortly before that time. Modern people and chimpanzees share an
estimated 98.5% of our DNA sequence, making us more closely related
to each other than either is to any other animal species. Therefore,
understanding chimpanzee hunting behavior and ecology may tell us a
great deal about the behavior and ecology of those very earliest hominids.
Noisy and curious, intelligent and social, the chimpanzee is the mammal
most like a human. Chimpanzees fascinate humans and are favorites both
in zoos and the wild. In East Africa the chimpanzee is found in the wild in
Tanzania and Uganda, but only in captivity in Kenya. Gombe National
Park in Tanzania is the first park in Africa specifically created for
chimpanzees. The chimpanzee has a thickset body with long arms, short
legs and no tail. Much of the body is covered with long black hair, but the
face, ears, fingers and toes are bare. They have hands that can grip firmly,
allowing them to pick up objects. The discovery that they used “tools”
for certain purposes surprised the world.
Their social structure is more variable than that of the gorilla. Rainforest
animals live in troops of males, of females with young, of males and females
with young, or of adults of both sexes without young. The composition of
the troop often changes. Savanna chimpanzees generally live in more
stable troops of 1 or more males, several females and their young. They
occupy a home range, the size of which depends on the size of the troop
and on the food supply. Neighboring troops meet with much noise and
communication, but there is usually little aggression. Active in the
daytime, chimpanzees rise at dawn and feed mainly on plant material,
such as fruit, nuts, leaves, shoots and bark, and on eggs and insects. Savanna
chimpanzees will kill young animals for food by holding them by the
77
hind limbs and striking their heads on the ground. At night, chimpanzees
usually sleep in the trees, each making its own nest with interwoven,
broken and bent branches. Chimps live in loose communities and the
entire troop may never assemble all together, but they share a home
range which is fiercely protected from intruders. Community members
forage by themselves or in small groups that are all male, all female or
mixed. Female chimpanzees emigrate when they reach adolescence.
Since a community’s female members are mostly unrelated they do not
associate closely and are not even necessarily on friendly terms. Males,
however, share blood ties and often cooperate. Mothers and male
offspring also maintain ties that can last throughout their lives. Chimps
are incredibly vocal and use a complicated system of sounds to
communicate with each other. They hoot, scream, grunt and drum on
hollow trees with the flat of their hands, sometimes for hours. The female
chimp has an estrus cycle of about 34 to 35 days. While in heat, the bare
skin on her bottom becomes pink and swollen, and she may mate with
several males. Usually 1 young is born, sometimes twins, after a gestation
of 227 to 232 days. The young animal lives closely with its mother for 2 to
3 years. The baby clings tightly to her mother’s breast and, like a human
baby, develops rather slowly. An infant can sit up at 5 months and stand
with support at 6 months. It is still suckled and sleeps with its mother until
about 3 years of age, finally becoming independent and separating from
her at about 4 years. Sexual maturity is reached between 8 and 10 years.
The intelligent, social chimpanzee has a wide range of sounds and
gestures for communication and is probably one of the most expressive
of all animals. Thickset and robust, but more lightly built than the gorilla,
the chimpanzee has a strong body and long limbs, the powerful arms
being longer than the legs. Its hands and feet are narrow and long, with
opposable thumbs on the hands. Males are slightly larger than females.
There is great variability in the color of hair and facial skin, but the hair is
generally blackish and the face light, darkening in older individuals. The
rounded head bears broad, prominent ears, and the lips are mobile and
protrusible. Chimpanzees climb well but spend most of the time on the
ground, where they generally walk on all fours, even though they stand
erect on occasion, as when their hands are full of food. Chimps touch
each other a great deal and may kiss when they meet. They also hold
hands and groom each other. An adult chimp often has a special “friend”
or companion with which it spends a lot of time. Female chimps give
78
their young a great deal of attention and help each other with babysitting
chores. Older chimps in the group are usually quite patient with energetic
youngsters. Chimps are diurnal (but often active on moonlit nights) and
begin their activities at dawn. After descending from their night nests
they hungrily feed on fruits, their principal diet, and on leaves, buds and
blossoms. After a while their feeding becomes more selective, and they
will choose only the ripest fruit. They usually pick fruit with their hands,
but they eat berries and seeds directly off the stem with their lips. Their
diet consists of up to 80 different plant foods.
Human – The Third Chimpanzee
A long time ago, religious propagandists declared that humans were
created in God’s image and that He had given us dominion over the
Earth. They could never have foreseen that: a couple of millennia later
we would devise a system of inquiry called ‘the scientific method,’ and
that eventually that method would be used to examine ourselves in minute
detail. The most interesting essays explore the behavioral, genetic, and
evolutionary links among the great apes, including humans, even
expressing a view of man as “the third chimpanzee.” Jared Diamond has
provided us with that invaluable author’s service of sifting through
mountains of scientific papers to create a drop-your-jaw look at
everything that is now known about humans—where we came from,
who we are, and where we’re going. In 1991, the Pulitzer prize-winning
ecologist called humans “the third chimpanzee”, setting us alongside the
common chimp (Pan troglodytes) and its less aggressive but astoundingly
promiscuous cousin, the bonobo (Pan paniscus). It is a wide-ranging book
by Jared Diamond, which applies insights from biology, anthropology,
and linguistics to questions such as why one species of big mammal
(humans) came to dominate its closest relatives, such as chimpanzees,
and why one group of humans (eurasians) came to dominate others
(Indigenous peoples of the Americas). It also examines how asymmetry
in male and female mating behavior is resolved through differing social
structures across cultures, and how first contact between unequal
civilizations almost always results in genocide. The book ends by noting
that technological progress may cause environmental degradation on a
scale leading to extinction.
The title of the book refers to how similar taxonomically chimps and
humans are; and that their genes differ by just 1.6%, whereas chimp and
gorillas differ by 2.3%. Thus the chimp’s closest relatives are not the
79
other apes with which it is classed, but the human. In fact, the chimpanzeehuman difference is smaller than some within-species distances: e.g. even
closely related birds such as the red-eyed and white-eyed vireos differ
by 2.9%. Going by genetic differences, humans should be treated as a
third species. The use of tools in the wild by chimpanzees has been
observed and well established for some time now and in fact recently
chimps have also been observed successfully hunting lemurs with crude
yet self-crafted spears. On the other hand tool use by gorillas in the wild
has been little observed and certainly not to the same extent or
sophistication as their more rambunctious cousins, the chimpanzee. So
then do these observations lay to rest once and for all the age old
quandary about “which species of ape is second to man in intelligence”?
Man is an ape and a primate. Just as a baboon is a monkey and a primate.
The trunk of this trees is; primate. Two of the branches are monkeys and
apes. Each branch has separate species or twigs. We are a twig on the
ape branch and baboons are a twig on the monkey branch. Even a pope
agreed that if there is evolution then it is a part of God’s plan. Humans are
a limb attached to the branch called; great apes, or apes, extending from
primate family tree trunk. Baboons are a limb connected to another
branched called; monkeys, attached to the same primate family tree
trunk. Humans are part of one big family called ‘primates.’ We belong to
a branch from that family called ‘great apes; chimpanzees, gorillas,
bonobos, humans and orangutans. Monkeys are another branch from that
‘primate’ family. However all monkeys and great apes may have evolved
from a single ancestral source. Just as other species; such as all dogs may
have evolved from a one dog common ancestor.
By 1999 confusion over the biological status of chimpanzees prompted
scientists in New Zealand to join forces with lawyers to petition the
country’s government to pass a bill conferring “rights” on chimpanzees
and other primates. The move drew derision. Roger Scruton, the moral
philosopher, asked: “Do we really think that the jails of New Zealand should
henceforth be filled with malicious chimpanzees? If not, by what right
are they to be exempted from punishment?” New Zealand granted great
apes legal protection from animal experimentation. British Home Office
guidelines also forbid experiments on chimps, gorillas and orangutans. In
2003, researchers at Wayne State University in Detroit again ignited the
debate when they found that 99.4% of the most critical DNA sites are
identical in human and chimp genes, prompting the lead researcher,
Morris Goodman, to declare that chimps and humans should be brought
80
together under the same umbrella genus, Homo. “There have been
discussions about whether chimpanzees should be afforded more
protection and this might make things a bit clearer in peoples’ minds
about whether they should have rights of some kind. In terms of life on
Earth, chimps and humans are really not that different to each other,” said
Andrew Rambaut, an evolutionary biologist at Oxford University.
Practically, he adds, reclassification could raise the chimp’s profile and
potentially improve their conservation. “It seems a bit human-centric to
want to put chimps into the ‘Homo’ genus and not reclassify humans as ‘Pan’.
But these things are arbitrary, once you’ve divided it into species. It would
become a more political decision than anything else,” he said.
It is now recognized that certain regions of the human brain play a
more significant role in the processes of functional memory, emotional
behavior, creative thought, motor control (movement), planning and
decision making as well as language. The aspect of the brain most closely
associated with such processes is the frontal lobe. Many of the
sophisticated behavioral patterns and attributes characteristic of humans
are believed to originate from the frontal lobe and in fact this area of the
brain has been identified as the most likely candidate responsible for
species-specific cognitive ability and characteristics. Bearing this in mind,
it is little wonder that researchers and scientists are eagerly studying
anatomical comparisons of the brains of the great apes (man inclusive)
with particular emphasis on the frontal lobes of the cerebral hemispheres
of the brain. Though it is now understood that simple brain-to-body size
comparisons are woefully inadequate to assess overall intellectual
capability there is still some value in applying it as a tool of measure or at
the very least as a comparative assessment. When evaluating brain size
data one has to bear in mind that there is significant sexual dimorphism
(variation between females and males) across several of the great apes;
most commonly brain capacity/size is larger in male specimens than
females, though like humans, the Bonobo chimp (Pan paniscus) shows
little if any size/capacity variation. That said, although a comparative
review of the cranial capacity of the great apes is not a particularly
accurate assessment of overall intelligence it does have its merits.
The following figures are mean values generated from varying size
samples of both female and male specimens of the various great apes:
Humans: 1400cc; Gorillas: 500cc; Chimpanzee: 405cc; Orangutan: 355;
Gibbons: 104cc. From these figures you can see that the brain volume of
the human being is almost 3x the size of the nearest contender, the gorilla.
81
With regards to those figures what is of particular note is that the cranial
capacity of the gorilla apparently exceeds that of the chimpanzee yet all
observed evidence tends to indicate that the chimpanzee is more
intelligent than the gorilla. Again this to some extent reaffirms the earlier
observation that brain capacity alone does not fully account for
intellectual ability. It should also be noted that studies conducted by
different researchers often resulted with fairly different conclusions
notably that the cranial capacity of the orangutan exceeded that of the
chimpanzee; for the other great apes the cranial capacities were generally
the same across multiple research data. So if overall cranial capacity is a
poor indicator of intelligence what then could be a better tool of measure
so to speak? As previously mentioned the frontal lobes of the cerebral
hemispheres of the brain are now recognized as the seat or center
responsible for those behavioral characteristics that distinguish us as
human being. It quite logically follows then that establishing the variations
and morphological differences within the cerebral frontal lobe areas of
gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos and orangutans and comparing them to
those of the human being is as good a place as any to best determine
which of the great apes is next to man in intelligence and what particular
features of the human brain (other than overall volume) account for man’s
intellectual uniqueness.
Small or Lesser Apes – Gibbons and Siamangs
Gibbons are apes in the family Hylobatidae, the earliest-known primate
date from about 70 million years ago. The greater apes (family Pongidae,
gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, humans and orangutans) split off from
the small apes (family Hylobatidae, gibbons and siamangs) 20 million
years ago. Also called the lesser apes, gibbons differ from great apes in
being smaller, exhibiting low sexual dimorphism, in not making nests,
pair-bonding, and in certain anatomical details in which they superficially
more closely resemble monkeys than great apes do. Gibbon-like fossils
have been found in Africa (from the Oligocene and Miocene), Europe
(from the Miocene), and Asia (from the upper Pliocene and Pleistocene).
The family Hylobatidae consists of 4 genera based on their diploid
chromosome number: Hylobates (44), Hoolock (38), Nomascus (52), and
Symphalangus (50), and 14 species of gibbon, including the Lar Gibbon
and the Siamang, collectively known as the lesser apes. The Lar Gibbon
(Hylobates lar), also known as the White-handed Gibbon, is one of the
more well-known gibbons and is often seen in zoos. Except for gorillas
82
and humans, all true apes are agile climbers of trees. The Siamang Gibbon
(Symphalangus syndactylus) is a tailless, arboreal, black furred gibbon
native to the forests of Malaysia, Thailand, and Sumatra, the largest of the
lesser apes, the Siamang can be twice the size of other gibbons, reaching
1 m in height, and weighing up to 14 kg. The Siamang is the only species
in the genus Symphalangus. The extinct Bunopithecus sericus is a gibbon
or gibbon-like ape which, until recently, was thought to be closely related
to the Hoolock gibbons. Gibbons are masters of their primary mode of
locomotion, brachiation, swinging from branch to branch for distances
of up to 15 m (50 ft), at speeds as high as 56 km/h (35 mph). They can also
make leaps of up to 8 m (27 ft), and walk bipedally with their arms raised
for balance. They are the fastest and most agile of all tree-dwelling, nonflying mammals.
Siamang
The Siamang is a gibbon and like the latter, it is an ape, not a monkey. The chief
characteristics distinguishing apes from monkeys are the absence of a tail, their
more or less upright posture and the high development of their brain. (Gorillas,
chimpanzees and orangutans are also apes.) The Siamang is always black in color,
with reddish-brown eyebrows. It differs from other gibbons in that it has a webbing
between the second and third toe. The largest of the gibbon family, Siamangs are
also the best at walking on two legs. Like other gibbons, they have tough, horny
pads on their buttocks known as ischial callosities. Since Siamangs and Gibbons
build no sleeping nest, the pads help them spend a comfortable night seated on
tree branches safe from predators. Male and female are similar in size, growing to
30-35 inches in length and weighing approximately 23 pounds. Along with other
gibbons, the Siamangs are the top trapeze artists of the animal world. They leap
with confidence across formidable gaps between branches, launching themselves
30-50 feet, using their hands as hooks. This mode of locomotion is called brachiation.
While their arms are used for travel, their feet are used to carry objects. When
walking, Siamangs will hold their arms above their heads for balance. Siamangs
live in family groups lead by a dominant male. They are protective of one another
and sociable among themselves, huddling together in groups of two or three when
they sleep.
Depending on species and gender, gibbon’s fur coloration varies from
dark to light brown shades, and anywhere in between black and white. It
is rare to see a completely white gibbon. Gibbons are social animals.
They are strongly territorial, and defend their boundaries with vigorous
visual and vocal displays. The vocal element, which can often be heard
for distances of up to 1 km, consists of a duet between a mated pair, their
83
young sometimes, joining in. In most species males, and in some also
females, sing solos that attract mates as well as advertise their territory.
The songs can make them an easy find for poachers who engage in the
illegal wildlife trade and in sales of body parts for use in traditional
medicine. The gibbons’ ball-and-socket joints allow them unmatched
speed and accuracy when swinging through trees. Because they are so
dextrous while moving in the trees, almost no predators can catch them.
Nonetheless, their mode of transportation can lead to hazards when a
branch breaks or a hand slips, and researchers estimate that the majority
of Gibbons fracture their bones one or more times during their lifetimes.
Most species are threatened or endangered, most importantly from
degradation or loss of their forest habitat. Gibbons occur in tropical and
subtropical rainforests from northeast India to Indonesia and north to
southern China, including the islands of Sumatra, Borneo and Java.
Life span is 30 to 40 years. This species is threatened for a several
reasons. These gibbons are hunted for meat in some areas. Live capture
for the pet trade also poses a serious problem. In many Asian countries, it
is “fashionable” to own your own primate, and this has led to the death of
many gibbons either at the time of capture or during transport. The final,
and greatest, threat to the gibbon is deforestation. Rainforests are
disappearing at an alarming rate due to logging and agricultural, leaving
forest species with an ever smaller region in which to live. Some efforts
are being made to save these primates, such as national parks and
reserves, but they are not very effective. Laws protect them from live
capture, but they are rarely enforced. Gibbon populations are decreasing;
they are threatened with extinction. There are estimated to be about
79,000 Lar gibbons (the white-handed or common gibbon). Lar gibbons
retain only 10% of their original habitat in protected reserves. In 1987,
the IUCN estimated that there were 79,000 Lar gibbons but to protect
the more endangered species, all are listed as endangered by the USDI
(1980) and are on appendix 1 of the CITES, prohibiting commercial trade
in gibbons.
Am I Still Evolving?
Some people think that we are definitely still continuing to evolve.
But some other people think that we have stopped evolving, because
cultures and technologies today have shielded us from the effects of
natural selection. Natural selection is the main way in which living things
evolve. By creating our own homes and environments, growing and
84
making our own food, and using drugs and vaccines to cure and prevent
diseases, more people survive and live longer than our earlier ancestors.
But have we really stopped evolving? Our evolutionary history has
produced us, a truly amazing primate, but are we clever enough to ensure
we have a future?
Evolution Today - Two types of evolution affect people today. These
are biological and cultural evolution. Biological evolution results from the
impact of genetic changes through mutations, while cultural evolution
refers to the technological innovations that distinguish Homo sapiens
from the rest of the earlier human species. Biological evolutionary changes
are usually much slower and may be hard to notice, except for living
things that live for only a very short time, such as bacteria and other
micro-organisms.
Evolution in Action-Survival of the Fittest – In the past many diseases
had severe effects on human populations. Only those people with natural
resistance survived and so our populations were subjected to natural
selection, the driving force of evolution. We can now prevent many
diseases by using antibiotics and other drugs, and we also vaccinate
people so that their own immune systems can combat these diseases.
However, many of the bacteria and viruses that cause disease are very
rapidly evolving resistance against these drugs. These are examples of
biological evolution in action. But we are also still evolving.
Malaria and Sickle-Cell-Anaemia – The malaria parasite spreads
between people by blood-sucking mosquitoes. In many areas it is now
resistant to the drugs commonly used to treat it, so new drugs are now
needed. But some people are naturally resistant. The malaria parasite
needs to enter red blood cells to survive and increase in numbers, but
sickle-cells are the wrong shape and to the parasite cannot survive.
People who carry the sickle-cell-anaemia gene are common in 25% of
people in areas with high levels of malaria. Sickle-cell-anaemia is an
inherited disease which affects the structure of our red blood cells that
carry oxygen around our bodies. People who inherit the gene for sicklecell-anaemia from both parents are very sick, because they find it hard to
get enough oxygen when breathing. But people who have one sicklecell-anaemia gene are not affected and are better able to survive in
areas with malaria than people who do not.
Ebola Virus – Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever is a deadly viral disease
characterized by massive bleeding and destruction of internal tissues.
85
The disease is caused by the Ebola virus, named for the Ebola River in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo (Zaire in Africa). The Ebola-Zaire virus
causes death in 90% of cases. There are no proven drugs to treat Ebola
hemorrhagic fever. Convalescence from the disease is slow, often lasting
five weeks or more, and is marked by weight loss and amnesia in the
early stages of recovery. Scientists still do not understand why some
patients manage to survive infection, while others do not. Many scientists
believe that this effect is one of the proofs for human evolution: growing
resistant to the virus. Currently, there is little hope of developing a vaccine
against the Ebola virus. Near the end of one outbreak in the city of Kikwit
in Zaire in 1995, blood from convalescent patients was transfused into
severely ill victims in an attempt to transfer antibodies and T-lymphocytes
(a type of immune system cell) that might neutralize the Ebola virus and
destroy infected cells. This procedure met with some success, but
carefully controlled trials must be conducted to confirm the safety and
effectiveness of this method.
HIV Evolution Now – Currently the huge epidemic of HIV is having a
catastrophic and tragic effect on many millions of people throughout
the world. In areas where there are no remedies, it is very likely that
natural selection is acting to select for those people that show some
resistance to this virulent virus. We cannot predict the direction of
evolution, but it seems possible that some human populations will
eventually evolve to be able to better survive this terrible disease.
Evidence for Recent Evolution – Although many people think that our
species, Homo sapiens, has stopped evolving, we have been changing
several ways over the last few tens of thousands of years. Here are some
examples:
Shrinking Brains and Shrinking Bodies – The human brain size reached
its peak about 30,000 years ago and some scientists have proposed that
the brain has been shrinking ever since and that it is only about 80% of
what it was. But our bodies have shrunk too, so that relative to body size
we are just as brainy. This size shrinkage has affected many mammals
over the last 30,000 years.
Evolution in Action – Plastic People – Around the world we can see a lot
of evidence of changing humans, but is this really evolution? Our jaws
are getting smaller such that our teeth cannot fit on the jaw, hence the
need to have some teeth removed by the doctors. We are getting taller
and taller and some of us getting fatter and fatter. However, these changes
86
are not evolution, but are caused by changes in our environment, and
affect how we grow. These changes are not biological evolution since
they do not involve genetic changes. More nutritious foods allow us to
grow to more of our evolutionary potential, but our jaws do not develop
properly because our food is too soft and so there is not enough room for
our teeth to squeeze in. If we eat too much, we lay down the excess
energy as fat under our skin and around our internal organs, which leads
to obesity and can eventually damage our health.
Cultural Evolution – In the past, information was passed from person
to person and down the generations by word of mouth, our traditions
and knowledge depended on what our brains could remember. Cultural
evolution has seen the increasingly rapid development of technologies
that help us survive by evolving new ways to store and pass on information
so that we do not just depend on our memories.
Cultural Catastrophe-Our Future in Our Hands – Our future is in our
hands. There is no doubt that cultural evolution is having the most effect
on us today. As we develop more incredible technologies that require
even more of the Earth’s energy and resources, so are we damaging the
Earth’s life support systems on which we are all totally depend? We are
the cause for Global Warming and deforestation and our human activity
drives hundreds and thousands of species to extinction. What will happen
next? The world will carry on without us once Homo sapiens becomes
extinct, no doubt about that. But that is of no account to me, to my people,
and to the rest of the human species. None of us will be around. But from
the ashes of Homo sapiens, another super-human species will evolve and
there is no doubt about that either! However, the period over which we
have responsibility, the period in which we have an interest as a species,
the period in which we can make a difference, is now.
If our presence here, in our present form, is indeed random and
contingent, then at least we can consciously look forward to the further
evolution of our poor brains, and to stupendous advances in medicine
and life extension, derived from work on our elementary stem cells and
umbilical and blood cells. In the steps of Darwin, Peter and Rosemary
Grant of Princeton University have gone for the thirty years to the
Galapagos Islands, lived in the arduous conditions of the tiny island of
Daphne Major, and actually watched and measured the way that finches
evolved and adapted as their surroundings changed. They have shown
conclusively that the size and shape of the finches’ beaks would adjust
87
themselves to drought and scarcity, by adaption to the size and character
of different seeds and beetles. Not only could the three million year old
original flock change in one way, but if the beetle and seed situation
changed back, their beaks could follow suit. The Grants took care, and
they saw it happening, and could publish their findings and proofs for all
to see. We are in their debt. Their lives were harsh, but who could wish
that they had mortified themselves in a holy cave or on top of a sacred
pillar instead?
In 2005, a team of researchers at the University of Chicago conducted
serious work on two genes, known as microcephalin and ASPM, that when
disabled are the cause of microcephaly. Babies born with this condition
have a shrunken cerebral cortex, quite probably an occasional reminder
of the period when the human brain was very much smaller than it is now.
The evolution of humans has been generally thought to have completed
itself about fifty to sixty thousand years ago (an instant in evolutionary
time), yet those two genes have apparently been evolving faster in the
past thirty seven thousand years, raising the possibility that the human
brain is a work in progress. In March 2006, further work at the same
university revealed that there are some seven hundred regions of the
human genome where genes have been reshaped by natural selection
within the past five thousand to fifteen thousand years. These genes
include some of those responsible for our “senses of taste and smell,
digestion, bone structure, skin color and brain function.” One of the great
emancipating results of genomics is to show that all “racial’ and color
differences are recent, superficial, and misleading. It is moral certainty that
between the time I finish, writing this book and the time that it is published,
several more fascinating and enlightening discoveries will be made in
this burgeoning field. It may be too soon to say that all the progress is positive
or “upward”, but human development is still under way. It shows in the
manner in which we acquire immunities, and also in the way in which we
do not. Genome studies have identified early groups of Northern
Europeans who learned to domesticate cattle and acquired a distinct
gene for “lactose tolerance”, while some people of more recent African
descent as I discussed earlier, are prone to a form of sickle-cell anemia
which, while upsetting in and of itself, results from an earlier mutation
that gave protection against malaria. And all this will be further clarified
if we are modest and patient enough to understand the building blocks
of nature and the lowly stamp of our origins.
88
Bibliography
1.
The Primates by Sarel Eimerl and Irven De Vore, Time Life Books,
New York, 1965.
2.
Origins Reconsidered by Richard Leakey and Roger Lewin, Abacus
Publications’ London, 2009.
3.
Exploring Human Society by William Williams and Norman Sheffe,
McGraw-Hill Ryerson Limited, London, 1989.
4.
Cradle of Humankind by Brett Hilton-Barber and Prof. Lee R. Berger,
Struik Publishers, Cape Town, 2002.
5.
Drawn to the Divine by William E. Reiser, S.J. Ave Maria Press, Notre
Dame, Indiana, 1984.
6.
God, Where are you? By Gerard W. Hughes, Daton and Longman,
London, England, 1997.
7.
The Many Faces of the Divine by Hermann Haring and Johann
Baptist Metz, Concilium, SCM Press, New York, 1995.
8.
Celebrations of Life by Rene Bubos, McGraw-Hill Book Company,
Madrid, Spain, 1982.
9.
Earth-The Lost Paradise of Happiness by Rayappa A.Kasi, Lokavani
Publications, Chennai, India, 2009.
10.
The Hunters are the Hunted by CK. Brain, University of Chicago
press, Chicago, 1981.
11.
Iron Age Migrations by T. Huffman, Wits University Press,
Johannesburg, South Africa, 1989.
12.
The South African Fossil Ape-men, the Australopithecines by R.
Broom and Schepers, GWH, Transvaal Museum, Pretoria, South
Africa, 1946.
13.
The Wildlife of Southern Africa by VC. Carruthers, Cape Town, South
Africa, 2000.
14.
It’s a Matter of Survival by Anita Gordon and David Suzuki, Harper
Collins Publications, London, 1991.
15.
Resources used from the Anthropological Museum in Dar-EsSalaam and Olduvai Gorge, Museum of Anthropology in Tanzania,
Natural History Museum of Nairobi in Kenya.
89
16.
Resources used from DVD titled “Walking with the Cavemen”
produced by BBC. Corporation, London, 2003.
17.
Resources used from DVD titled “ The Story of Neanderthals”
produced by “The History Channel,” U.S.A.
18.
Resources used also from the Encyclopedia Britannica and from
the Microsoft Encarta 2007.
19.
The Discovery of Lucy (Denkenesh) by John Reader, Selamata,
The inflight magazine of Ethiopian Airline, Volume 25, January to
March 2008, Addis Ababa.
20.
99% Ape. How Evolution adds up? Edited by Jonathan Silvertown.
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2009.
21.
The Greatest Show on Earth. The Evidence for Evolution by Richard
Dawkins. Free Press, Sydney, Australia, 2009.
22.
Wonders of Biodiversity by Roy A. Gallant. Benchmark Books.
Marshall Gavendish. New York, 2003.
23.
Consilience. The Unity of Knowledge by Edward O.Wilson.
Published by Alfred A. Knoph, Inc. New York. 1998.
24.
The Living Ocean by Boyce Thorne Miller and John Catena. Island
Press. Washington, 1991.
25.
Evolution-The Story of Life by Douglas Palmer. University of
California Press. Berkeley, Los Angeles, 2009.
26.
Tales from the Underground. A Natural History of Subterranean
Life by David W. Wolfe. Perseus Publishing, Boston, 2001.
27.
The cradle of Life. The Discovery of Earth’s Earliest Fossils by J.
William Schoph. Princeton University Press. New Jersey, 1999.
28.
Until the Sun Dies by Robert Jastrow. W.W. Norton and Company
Incorporation. New York, 1977.
29.
The fifth Miracle. The Search for the Origin and Meaning of Life by
Paul Davies. Simon and Schuster. New York, 1999.
30.
Darwin’s Gift. To science and Religion by Francisco Ayala. Joseph
Henry Press. Washington, D.C. 2001.
90
Chapter II
The Story of Man Reaches its Omega Point1
“We have made thee neither of heaven nor of earth, neither mortal nor
immortal, so that with freedom and choice and with honor, as though the maker
and molder of thyself, thou mayest fashion thyself in whatever shape thou shalt
prefer. Thou shalt have power to degenerate into the lower forms of life which are
brutish. Thou shalt have the power, out of thy soul’s judgment, to be reborn into
the highest forms, which are divine.” Pico della Mirandola, Oration on the Dignity
of Man.
“You are more than you ‘think’ you are!” Indian Manu Shastra.
Just a few years ago, the famous anthropologist, L.S.B. Leakey, who had
labeled the Peking man as being 100,000 years old, attended a press
conference in San Francesco in conjunction with the symposium of his
colleague, Father Teilhard de Chardin. Professor Leakey had just lately
discovered the Tanganyika man, which he asserted was 300,000 years old.
The reporters asked him how long man had been upon earth, and Leakey
said that he estimated that man probably went back some 20 million years.
Then he was asked about the future of the human race. His dolorous replies
pointed out that man had discovered atomic energy, and, with it, bombs,
biological warfare and chemical warfare, and that man was making for himself
not milestones of civilization, but tombstones. He cried out that ‘where faith is
maimed, science is blind.’ His faith was, he said, that man could be perfectible
and could literally become God but instead he saw nothing but doom;
tombstones, instead of milestones of civilization. The reporters were very upset
by this somber forecast and over and over asked could they not get a word
of hope, a tiny ray of hope from the great professor. Finally, he relented and
said: “Well maybe man could come to a higher consciousness and come to
his senses.” And then he was asked: “Well, how long do you think that would
take?” And his answer was: “Twenty million years more!” Hence, man is
constantly on the move fixing his eyes on the divine. We call him God. To
know God means to fathom the brotherhood of man in the fatherhood of
God. It prevents man’s alienation from God or from his neighbor by
The theory of Teilhard in which he argued that evolution as a purposive process
in which matter-energy of the universe has continually changed in the direction of
increased complexity.
1
committing him to worship the one heavenly Father while maintaining a
vital interest in the human affairs of the terrestrial community. We discern God
as the Point Omega towards which the world’s evolution and the whole of human
history are tending.
Scientific evolutionary theory is the key to Teilhard’s thought. Evolution,
he wrote, “is a general condition to which all theories, all hypotheses, all
systems must bow and which they must satisfy henceforward if they are to
be thinkable and true. Evolution is a light illuminating all facts. . . .” His major
work, The Phenomenon of Man (1955; trans. 1959), is an attempt to set forth a
comprehensive evolutionary vision that speaks to both scientific and religious
interests. Matter, argued Teilhard, has always obeyed “that great law of biology
. . . the law of ‘complexification’. ” He interpreted evolution as a purposive
process in which the matter-energy of the universe has continually changed
in the direction of increased complexity. With the emergence of humanity,
he argued, evolutionary development entered a new dimension. From the
biosphere (the layer of living things covering the earth) has emerged the
Noosphere (a mind layer surrounding the earth). This mind layer, or human
Noosphere
The present epoch is called “Neocene Epoch.” The term Noöcene epoch refers to
“how we manage and adapt to the immense amount of knowledge we’ve
created.” The noosphere is an ethereal communication infrastructure that
empowers the user by harnessing the power of the collective mind. The Noophere
is a predicted next evolutionary step in the development of life, a kind of
globalized thinking and consciousness. The Noosphere is defined as the sum total
of all human knowledge and experience. This would include everything from our
most private dreams to our knowledge of universe itself, with accelerating
technology as its catalyst. Teilhard used the term “noosphere” possibly first coined
by Vladimir Vernadsky to represent a sphere of mind encircling the Earth. As he
saw it, the Noosphere encased what we call the biosphere, or sphere of life. Within
this framework, Teilhard saw the ongoing evolution of the human species
manifesting itself as changes and advances in mind more than in body. In other
words, human evolution would henceforth take place mainly in the Noosphere.
In the book “The Phenomenon of Man,” Teilhard de Chardin observed that, from a
historical point of view, the “stuff” of this universe is becoming ever more complex,
that information is becoming ever more concentrated. This book wasn’t published
until the late 1950s, after its author, Teilhard had died. In it, he called this
enveloping sphere of thought the Noosphere and described it as “a living tissue of
consciousness” enclosing the Earth and growing ever more dense. For several
years after the book’s first English publication in 1959, Teilhard’s concept of a
92
The Story of Man Reaches its Omega Point
thinking membrane surrounding our planet provoked significant controversy in
both religious and academic circles. He further observed that, at least in this corner
of the cosmos, human beings are the most complex of all known forms found in
nature. From an evolutionary standpoint, he also saw that changes taking place in
the human species are occurring in the domain of mind at a much faster rate than
changes seem to appear in our biology.
consciousness, generates increasingly complex social arrangements that in
turn give rise to a higher consciousness. Ultimately, the evolutionary process
culminates in the convergence of the material and the spiritual into a
superconsciousness that Teilhard called the Omega Point. By his love, this
God-Omega attracts and thereby gives direction to the whole evolutionary
process. Such love, for Teilhard, is most clearly evident in the universal God.
The following discussion is based on this ‘Omega Point’, with little touch of
science fiction, with lots of imagination, at the same time imagination with
some potentiality, finding certainty with the help from spiritual and scientific
promptings. The vast geological time scale of human transitions is purely
hypothetical and exaggerated to accent the importance and the slow
unfolding time frame of human transformations.
I have consciously used lots of mysterious words, which this book will
have to explain. Which new modes of beings were to be created? What was
that something new that had to be realized? Radical words too, charged
with a will to confront all obstacles and aware of the beginning of a new
epoch in the history of humanity. As man arose out of the animal, so out of
man, superman shall come! The superman has always been living in
humanity’s dreams of power, invulnerability, immortality, boundless
knowledge, omnipresence, and of a love permanently as exhilarating and
pure as first love. If the longing to fly is there, it may be realized one day in a
man simpler and smoother way than airplanes do today. If the longing to talk
and see at a distance is there, it may be realized without the complicated
and fragile machines needed at present. And those people who have long
labored to acquire a certain knowledge, and are therefore called sages, say
that the abiding and ever enraptured love is already present in that
dimensionless being hidden behind our heart, and that it can become a
constant, conscious state that never turns sour. We our species, will have to
find that out. It is impossible for the mind to forecast in detail what the
supermental change (superman) must be in its parts of life-action and outward
behavior or lay down for it what forms it shall create for the individual or the
93
collective existence. For the mind acts by intellectual rule or device or by
reasoned choice of will or by mental impulse or in obedience to the lifeimpulse; but supermental nature does not act by mental idea or rule or in
subjection to any inferior impulse: each of its steps is dictated by an innate
spiritual vision, a comprehensive and exact penetration into the truth of all
and the truth of each thing; it acts always according to inherent reality, not
by the mental idea, not according to an imposed law of conduct or a
constructive thought or perceptive contrivance.
Man, because he has acquired reason and still more because he has
indulged his power of imagination and intuition, is able to conceive an
existence higher than his own and even to envisage his personal elevation
beyond his present state into that existence. His idea of the supreme state is
an absolute of all that is positive to his own concepts and desirable to his
own instinctive aspiration … It is so that he conceives his gods; it is so that he
constructs his heavens. But it is not so that his reason conceives of the possible
earth and a possible humanity. His dream of God and Heaven is really a
dream of his own perfection; but he finds the same difficulty in accepting its
practical realization here for his ultimate aim as would the ancestral ape if
called upon to believe in himself as the future man. I feel that man has not
yet found his true self, his true nature by which he can successfully and
spontaneously live. But my mind forces me to ask that what is that which is
growing in us, but into which we have not yet grown?
Homo sapiens to Homo sentiens: 5000 BC to 7000 AD
“We see God’s presence in every aspect of Creation. His energy is present in
every act of Creation, especially in human progress” (Rowan Williams,
Archbishop of Canterbury).
We are all born with the need to love and be loved. Could also be argued
that it’s love that drives us and without that we have nothing. When we are
born our first impulse is to look for mother, the love and the protection it
provides. This is why even when children are born in a critical condition
they must have some contact with their mother or a mother figure. Without
it the bond they have with parents or possibly humans as a whole could be
affected. My point is we are all born with the same base instincts and inert
compulsions now as we did when we were apes. It’s a mammalian thing. In
short my argument is that we’re born emotional beings and we’re heavily
rooted in that. Feelings of faith, hope and love have an extraordinary ability
in themselves and I’m convinced about the inevitability of mankind rising to
94
another level. There is something fundamentally ironic in the fact that we are
now beginning to understand ourselves as homo sentiens (the feeling human
being) rather than homo sapiens ( a paradigm shift which has its own
philosophical perils), but at the same time we are expanding our knowledge
of the rational capacities of nonhuman animals. Much confusion comes from
the general belief that the expressions human beings and Homo sapiens
have exactly the same meaning, whereas they really differ profoundly in
their connotations. Members of the species Homo sapiens are not born with the
attributes essential for the truly human life but rather potentialities that enable
them to become human. These potentialities can be expressed only if the
newborn Homo sapiens creature has the opportunity, from very early in life,
to grow and function among other human beings, in any one of the many
different kinds of human societies.
We become human only to the extent that we take advantage of these
opportunities. I emphasize any one because past and present experience
demonstrates the people of all races and skin colors can rapidly learn to live
and function effectively among other people if they have been socialized
early in life, even in a very primitive society. People of different social groups
think, feel and speak differently about different things, but they can all think,
feel and speak, the attributes that transform Homo sapiens into a human
being of feelings. When stripped to our purely biological basis, we are just
animals closely related to the higher apes. Our biological nature cannot
account alone for our social patterns and cultural concerns, and even less for
the distinctive persona by which each one of us is known, and which we
create to a very large extent ourselves through our own choices. The
difference between animality and humanness can be illustrated by one of
the simplest, yet most striking behavioral difference between animals, even
the most noble and spectacular and human beings even the most primitive.
In theory, lions, tigers, polar bears, orangutans, gorillas, and other powerful
animals could readily extend their habitats by displacing other creatures.
But in nature they rarely if ever move out of the natural environment in
which they have evolved and to which they are biologically adapted; they
even remain highly localized within the environment. The same can be said
of practically all other animal species, weak as well as strong. Migratory birds
are not an exception to this rule. It is along a preordained course and
according to a seasonal program to which they must conform.
In the wild, the good life for an animal means carrying out those particular
activities for which its instincts have been programmed during its evolutionary
development in its natural habitat. The reason for this “parochialism” of wild
95
animals is not that they could not survive under conditions different from
those of their native habitats. The zoo experience proves that, with minor
accommodations, most species can live and reproduce in places far removed
and under conditions very different from the natural environments in which
they have evolved. Animals stay in their native habitats probably for the
simple reason that they have no need to seek conditions other than the
narrow range to which they have been adapted biologically and behaviorally
by Darwinian evolution and by the accidents of their birth and upbringing.
It is doubtful that they can even conceive of existence under conditions
other than the ones under which they have developed. And yet, they may
respond to the ‘natural’ conditions of their evolutionary past, even if they have
never experienced them. The natural habitat of a wild animal is its Eden. We
feel guilty when we move any particular wild animal to another place, even
if the new conditions
Eden
make its life easier and
Eden in Hebrew means ‘delight’, in the Bible, the first
longer,
probably
residence of humankind. Because contemporary
because
we,
too,
scholars tend to regard the biblical descriptions as
occasionally long for an
imaginary, controversy has revolved around the
animal-like existence in
question of the geographic location of Eden. Also
Eden. Our biological
called Garden of Eden or Garden of Paradise, the
cradle, our Eden, was a
name Eden is probably connected with Edinn, a
semitropical savanna
Sumerian name for the plain of Babylon.
with few large trees with
a diversity of vegetation and seasonal changes. Unlike wild animals, however,
we human beings have spread all over the Earth and most of us have now
settled in environments to which we are not biologically adapted, however
we are emotionally attached (Homo sentiens). Sentiens means something that
can feel, or experience some form of emotion. For reasons that are not fully
understood, representatives of Homo erectus, the immediate precursors of
Homo sapiens, moved away from their biological Eden more than a million
years ago and ever since the human condition has been increasingly different
from animal life. Instead of living in nature, we modify natural environments
in order to create artificial habitats that fit the biological attributes that we
acquired during the Stone Age and that we retain wherever we settle on
earth, and even when we move into outer space.
Sentience is the ability to feel or perceive subjectively. The term is used
in philosophy (particularly in the philosophy of animal ethics and in eastern
philosophy) as well as in science fiction and in the study of artificial
intelligence. Many scientists feel that Homo sapiens is transforming into
96
Homo sentiens (man of feelings), on the other hand Pope Benedict in his
latest encyclical “Caritas in Veritate’ calls him Homo sociologicus. The root of
the word “emotion” is the Latin “emovere,” which connotes inner turbulence.
Emotions have an identifiable core that can carry a label such as love or fear,
but each is layered. Efforts to pin them are as doomed as locating the edge
of a fog. Besides, emotions often are masked, pretending to be what they are
not. What appears to be arrogance may be insecurity, and a humble,
apologetic person may be full of contempt. Humans unfold into emotional
maturity, by a process of spontaneous branching that no one yet understands.
Examinations of the nature of each, unique emotional tree has fascinated
sages and scientists since the beginning of time. Philosophers, deists and
other intrigued by inner space have sought without success to learn why
one person behaves wisely and other kills. The invention of theology is one
response to the riddle; psychology is another. Many emotions are
accompanied by distinct physical changes; entire careers have been spent
studying the physiology of emotion. The species could not have survived in the
wild from which it sprang without having systems that could react explosively in
an emergency. Muscles tense, the mouth dries and the heart pounds as the frantic
organism prepares itself either to fight or to flight. Emotions have been
producing startling alterations in the human body since the time of hominids.
From the beginning of the human species, fear, anger and hatred have caused
hearts to step up their blood input by as much as two-thirds. In an emergency,
livers release a flood of sugar which converts instantly to energy the
alimentary organs seize or else have an urge to empty adrenaline sends
power into the muscles and the brain circuitry approaches overload. Such
preparations for mortal combat are useful when someone faces a charging
carnivore in a primeval swamp.
In recent years investigation of emotions has become a major field of
research for behavioral scientists. The experts speculate on the origin and
composition of such emotions as love and fear but they cannot agree even
on what they are. Twentieth century, empowered by the insights of Freud,
his followers and his detractors, is obsessed with introspection and analysis.
Because there is more understanding of the chemical composition of
emotion and where they arise in the brain, there is fresh excitement that
neuroscientists will be able to unravel the puzzle of personality, and even
rebuild a personality to order. Some hope, and others fear, that comprehension
of human emotion will lead to chemical engineering of behavior. The insights
of the importance of early environment on emotional development have
been known for half a century without making much impression on society.
97
The enlightened radicals of the eighteenth century believed that happiness
was accessible to all citizens of the democracy. In the present Age of Anxiety,
people will settle for a smaller hero: a capacity for well-being. Scientists
currently are interested in what they have been learning about the brain’s
peculiar chemistry and the pathways that neuroelectricity carves in the
brain’s meat. Neurobiologists and neurochemists contemplate the gray threepound pudding of the human brain and see where it can be tickled to
produce a grin on the face or here it can be laced with a chemical that will
cause it to explode with rage. More than 100 chemicals found in the brain’s
stew and there are an estimated 30,000 genes which occur nowhere else in
the body except the cranial cavity. Much work is being done to harness this
information to the treatment of such disorders as schizophrenia, Parkinson’s
disease, multiple sclerosis, drug addiction, Alzheimer’s disease and
melancholia, but for thousands of other researchers the goal of interpreting
the brain better is to be able to rearrange personality.
More recent work has led to the conviction that there is an orderly
progression to emotional development. It is confounding those who believe
in the doctrine of original sin that it appears to be true that human experience
joy before sadness. Envy, ambition and social confidence all occur later, at a
higher level of development. There is no agreement on the precise time at
which each emotion is supposed to flower. Babies as young as three months
feel sadness, if they are abused or neglected by their parents. By ten months
their range of emotions includes joy, anger, misery, surprise and fear. A
biological clock seems to be governing the emotions. Emotional growth is
tied to the intellect, each level of intelligence providing the setting for
another group of increasingly more subtle and complex emotions. Shadings
come along as regularly as lunar eclipses. Shame develops at about eighteen
months, and by the age of four, children are capable of the adult experience
of worry. The ages of five and six are believed by some to be periods of
major emotional development because children are gaining perspective
on their physical and emotional separateness from everyone else in the
world. They are ready to begin to compare themselves with others and to
conform where they can and dig in where they can’t. This brings forth such
conflicting emotions as pride and humility, insecurity and confidence envy
and contempt.
No one is certain if the brain of a fetus is sufficiently developed in the
final few months before delivery for the unborn person to be storing
memories of the amniotic state and the trauma of birth. Many people,
particularly those who undergo hypnosis, believe that they can remember
98
details of their birth. The literature is rich in such stories as the one about a
man whose left arm hurt excruciatingly when he remembered being born.
On inquiry he learned for the first time that the obstetrician indeed had
hauled him through the final stages of delivery by grasping his left arm.
Numerous experiments have established that a fetus is listening and that the
fetal brain is collecting and storing information. Some scientists believe that
patterns which will control behavior for a lifetime are established before
birth. They are convinced that chemical alterations in the mother, such as
occur if she undergoes long periods in the grip of fear or anger, or if she
sustains a high level of anxiety, will carry their toxicity across the placental
barriers to flood the fetus. The suspicion is that the irritable nature of some
babies, the hypertension and colic which exhaust the infants and distress
their parents, are the consequences of a pregnancy marked by emotional
anguish. Emotional growth is like bone growth, moving in spurts and then
settling down for periods of consolidation. Unlike bones, however, emotions
can regress abruptly and spill even stable adults into childhood tantrums.
Much of a lifetime is spent on emotional plateaus between levels of
development, the person washed forward and backward between
confidence and anxiety. Since the natural tendency of the human organism
is to improve and grow, the normal thrust of emotional development is always
toward betterment.
Anxiety is the emotion which seems to have the strongest influence on
emotional development. A nervous, tense person is off-balance, requiring
more support and reassurances than others, seeing the world differently,
coming to conclusions on the basis of perceptions which are warped by
apprehension. Anxious people are less willing to change, to venture into a new
experience, to trust a relationship; they have less curiosity, enthusiasm, and
energy. They simply are too exhausted by internal stress. Anxiety is vivid and
has a focus. Fear disappears when the threat is over, but anxiety is endless.
Anxiety isn’t a single emotion but a cluster of several emotions, only one of
which is fear. Anxiety is a curry, a mixture which guilt may dominate in one
person and distress or shame in another. Fearful, anxious children never
seem to get enough love and attention. No matter how much comforting
and praise they receive, they are placated only briefly. Consequently they
are difficult, angry, jealous little people who are hard to like. Their own
conviction that no one cares about them can become true. Before anyone
appreciated the contradictions within emotions, the prevailing view was
that emotions came in separate boxes, one per package, pure and undiluted.
Rene Decartes mapped six primary emotions, which he chose to call love,
99
hate, astonishment, desire, joy and sorrow. Immanuel Kant, the great German
philosopher of the eighteenth century, described five feelings: love, hope,
modesty, joy and sorrow. William James, who brilliantly wrote “Principles of
Psychology” in 1890, is a founding document for Psychologists, and there
were only four major emotions: love, fear, grief and rage.
The study of the relationship between emotions and health has a name,
psychoneuroimmunology. Specialists in this new branch of science are
advising people who live under great stress to protect themselves against
such collapses as lung cancer or heart disease by changing their attitude or
their environment. Emotions can play a role on one’s physical health. The
psychosomatic basis of ulcers and asthma were among the first to be
accepted, but in recent years doctors have agreed that emotions can make
one susceptible to diseases ranging from sniffles to cancer. People can
“image” their white blood cells fighting the tumor until they succeed in
driving the cancer away. It is possible that eventually people will be able to
train their bodies to resist allergy-stimulating environments, for instance, or
to block out pain naturally. As researchers see science unfolding, people will
be able to give chemical instructions to their brains in order to keep their
bodies healthy and their emotions pleasant. Pleasure is carried by the
neurotransmitter dopamine, which sparkles through the brain’s networks,
blocking off receptors of dull or worrisome news, giving the brain a good
time. Appreciation of art, the contentment of a scuba diver cruising on a
coral reef, the urge to learn a craft, all derive from a network of nerve fibers
in the brain which seek to be pleased. Some seem driven to find an everstronger stimulus, a drug or an activity such as gambling or satyriasis. Whatever
gives the brain pleasure will be absorbed along the capering, supple
convectors, and the brain will crave more of the same.
Recently a new technique for measuring emotion has been attracting
attention. It is the work of two men, Paul Ekman and Wallace Friesen at the
University of California, who have developed a way of reading people’s
feelings by observing movements of the eighty facial muscles. They believe
that each emotion has a unique “signature” which is written on the face. These
facial expressions, when examined beside such physiological changes as
stepped-up heartbeat, give what they believe to be an accurate readout of
emotional content. The suspicion is growing that every emotion is learned in
the brain, in the sense that the neural transmitters become practiced at
handling that emotion, and that a different set of nerve fibers is trained for
each emotion. Accordingly, neuroscientists are now trying to locate each of
the tracks that carry the freight trains of emotion. It is believed that negative
100
emotions activate the right frontal area of the brain’s cortex and that positive
emotions are on the left. Where is the place in the brain that emotions are
produced? Experiments show conclusively that happiness is the chemical
stew in the left hemisphere and misery in the right. The brain operates on at
least three levels, possibly four. The first is normal consciousness, in which people
think they know what they are feeling. Below that is the unconscious, which
Freud plumbed, where powerful grievances lie suppressed. And below that
is the collective conscious, which Jung explored, where the specters of cave
people sleep fitfully. Under that is something else. It may be a “some flickering
lamp of the spirit” which we may designate the real “me” the spark of reality
which the religions call the soul. Emotions, like every other aspect of the
person, mature naturally, without effort. Given a modest diet of stability and
friendship, people drift from self-preoccupation and insecurity to steadiness
and outward-looking. The matchless neurons bustle about, day and night,
putting together cause and effect, working out rules of conduct and justice,
calibrating the worth content of behavior.
Love is the highest emotional development that humans can attain. It is
an enigma: love is learnt, bit by bit, from the chrysalis of an infant’s gratitude
for being fed, amused, made comfortable, and yet so natural and so right
that people capable of loving are healthier than others. Their outlooks are as
relaxed as their nervous system; they are at one with the universe. From the
beginnings of life to its end, love is the only emotion which matters. Mostly,
when people speak about love, they mean getting it, not giving it. Love, the
experts say, is the person’s victory over the negative emotions that bloom
early, self-doubt, guilt, anxiety. Most of the working in the field of human
emotions has come to believe that the basic nature of newborns is friendly
and cooperative; their inclinations are sociable. As proof, they cite the
evidence that the cluster of emotions associated with love and contentment
produce good health, while such emotions as depression and anger are
harmful to organs and cognitive development. The first love is always selflove. Unless there is self-love, existence is a poignant search for flattery. The
dynamic of love is easier to study in its manifestation in theology than in
person-to-person relationship. Freud declared that religion is a neurosis that
afflicts humans who cannot tolerate being alone. In fact Homo sentiens is
also rightfully can be called as Homo religious. There are at least 1500 religions
in the world and that tells us how emotional and sentimental the human
beings are? Religion is also used as a device for coping with fear or death, or
as reinforcement of controls to keep the inner demons from escaping. As the
human race evolves, the gods change. Religion caters the emotional needs of a
101
particular society in a particular time. The Old Testament describes a wrathful,
punitive God who sets hard tasks, while the God of the New Testament is
sociable and compassionate. Faith follows a growth curve which begins in a
Father God, moves to a Mother God and then passes through a God Rejection
phase, not unlike an adolescent’s rebellion against parents, to culminate in
God within. This highest placement of God is esteemed in all religions,
however outer-directed, for the spirituality that it projects. The merging of
self and God in oneness is revered as a private experience by Hindus and
Buddhists and interpreted by Christians and Jews as holiness and social
obligation.
Consequently ego is created by emotions, ambitions, desires, and by
greed. Everybody is telling you: “Become somebody special. Have power,
prestige, respectability, money, things that matter in the world.” All these
create slowly, slowly the idea of the ego, of superiority, of holier-than-thou,
higher-than-thou. This ego creates our saints and sinners, this ego creates our
so-called pontiffs, bishops and priests, our politicians, our presidents, prime
ministers. This is all the projections of the ego. It is a by-product of a certain
programming that society manages to befool you with. Once you see that
the ego is false, handed over to you by others, the whole house of falsity
simply disappears, like darkness when you bring light in. meditation will
bring the light from your very center, a cool fire. And when your interior
becomes luminous, you will not find any ego, any I. Just remember the
definition of health. When you don’t feel your body at all, your body is
healthy. You feel your head only when you have a headache. When you
don’t have any headache, you don’t have any head either, it is simply light,
it has no weight. When your legs are hurting, you have them. When they are
not hurting, they are absent, when the body is healthy … my definition of
health is that you are absolutely unaware of its existence. Whether it is there
or not makes no difference.
And the same is true about the healthy mind. It is only the insane mind
which is felt. When the mind is sane, silent, it is not felt. The mind is one of the
most significant things in life, but only as a servant, not as a master. The
moment the mind becomes your master, then the problems arise; then it
displaces your heart, displaces your being, takes over the whole possession
of you. Then rather than following your orders, it starts ordering you. I am not
saying to destroy the mind. It is the most evolved phenomenon in existence.
Mind is logic … immensely useful, and in the marketplace you cannot exist
without the mind. And I have never said that you should not use your mind
in the marketplace, you should use it. And the difference is great … It is mind
102
which has given you all technology, all science, but because the mind has
given so much, it has claimed to be the master of your being. That’s where
the mischief begins; it has completely closed the doors of your heart. Homo
sentiens, the moral agent whose decisions are expressive of who he is, rather
than instrumental means to further ends, remains central to any acceptable
model of human agency. Homo sentiens can neither be left in exile nor can
he be repatriated on rational choice soil without doing untold mischief.
Hence my suggestion that the upbringing of modernity’s man might fare
better if we left him with his emotions intact and allowed them to develop
with him. Certainly, I am going to maintain that he will not then much resemble
either Homo economicus or Homo sociologicus, but he does stand more
chance of presenting a human face.
Homo sentiens to Homo magnificus – 7000 AD to 14000 AD
“Having confidence or trusting that God exists and of feeling that he is in the
presence of something greater than you can conceive … something greater than
humans can put words to.” Dr. Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury.
It is inevitable that mankind will rise to another level—Homo magnificus.
What would differentiate the Homo magnificus from Homo sapiens? Would
they eat meat? Would they have as ambitions and desires? How would they
communicate? We may advance our technology however, possibly to an
extent in which we become one with that advance. The increasing
expeditionary quest to harness the possibilities of nanotechnology and
synthetic intervention within medicine may one day take our evolutionary
path up on a different artificial track whereupon we can no longer be
considered “homo” anything. Man will be a machine or a robot, no more
feelings. I’ll restrain from using the term cyborg because of its fantastical scifi myth connotations but that’s the principle behind my thinking. From an
increasingly younger age within our society we lose the most important
values such as love, empathy, loyalty, compassion. Children are expected to
be mini-adults at a very early age by being bombarded with the same
vociferous media advertising frenzy as adults and parents are increasingly
replacing values of real worth with that of the acquisition or consumption of
the right brand. Children now associate the possession of branded goods
and technology which is costly but has no value with love, as opposed the
possession of life skills which are invaluable. They will go on to do likewise
until babies are wearing nappies with a Nike tick on them. When these
children are at the stage where Education with a big E is gearing them up for
a place in society on the whole they are then expected to re-adjust their
103
sights on bigger consumables and to the extent that when they are set loose
on the world they “have to have” a car, cellphone, television, laptop, golf
clubs, a house, blah blah blah! So already we find technology in this case is
driving evolution and not the only way round. Making life simpler so you no
longer have to make important decisions about anything which in turn means
you lose the mechanisms to question everything. And if we lose the
mechanisms to question everything we are more easily controlled. Now
who consumes the most?
It would be the time of science, economics. Pope Benedict XVI, in his
latest encyclical, ‘Caritas in Veritate’ calls him: Homo economicus. The time of
Homo magnificus rightfully could be called the “Golden Age of Science.”
Imagine you’re driving on a highway flowing with quiet, enjoyable water
fueled cars. The air is so clean and fresh that you can stick your head out the
window and find it’s truly enjoyable to breathe! The highways sound like a
gentle loving hum of energy as these new water fueled cars run off of
electricity and only emit water from their exhaust. There is no toxic pollution
created at all. The air you breathe will be pure and free of carbon monoxide,
and you’ll be living in a green clean city free from any toxic brown clouds.
We will build our Earth’s ozone layer and there will be no need for another
war. There is plenty of water on the planet and an abundance of free reusable
energy. This technology will provide our planet with a clean cheap and
efficient way of powering our homes and fueling our cars. This awesome
water fuel technology is the number one solution for our energy crisis and
saving our planet. Environmentally friendly “green” technology is how we
will survive and thrive as a species. Our future is only as bright as we can imagine
and allow it to be. It can truly be a bright and flawless society with implementing
water fueled technology. Human vibration, energy, thoughts, words, ideas
and music, affect the molecular structure of water, the very same water that
comprises over 70% of a mature human body and covers the same amount
of our planet and 3.5 % salt in human body is also the same level in oceans.
Water is the very source of all life on this planet, its quality and integrity is
vitally important to all forms of life. The body is very much like a sponge and
is composed of trillions of chambers called cells that hold liquid. The quality
of our life is directly connected to the quality of our water. Water is a very
malleable substance. Its physical shape easily adapts to whatever
environment is present. But its physical appearance is not the only thing that
changes; its molecular shape also changes. The energy or vibrations of the
environment will change the molecular shape of water. In this sense water
104
not only has the ability to visually reflect the environment but it also
molecularly reflects the environment.
As we humans evolve into Homo magnificus, we increase our power
over nature and our own destiny. The next step of human progress will be to
inhabit, enhance, and eventually transform the universe. Over the past few
years, the rate of human achievements in all scientific fields has accelerated
dramatically. We are transforming the human body; tinkering with our genetic
arrangement to make ourselves smarter, faster, and healthier; and then
developing ways to clone the final product. We enhance the functioning of
the brain and implant that human brainpower into our machines. And we
unify the human family by developing global communication systems, such
as Internet. As our species extends our control over this planet, we
simultaneously prepare ourselves for extraterrestrial habitation by shaping
and transforming terrestrial landscapes. We design a new generation of
rockets that can transport us to distant spheres at one-third the speed of
light. At the same time, we probe the innermost recesses of nature through
such exotic fields as nanotechnology.2 We must examine the many ways
such developments impact the individual, society, and the economy. And
we must explore the underlying reasons why our species is feverishly working
to advance the planet and ourselves and transform all we encounter. When
we truly understand the depth and strength of man’s overwhelming
imperative to grow and progress, we can more clearly anticipate the future.
At first blush, it would seem that there is little mystery about the impulses
driving the human species in this quest: We engage in such productive
activities merely to enhance our material condition. We invent technologies
that will improve our standard of living and make our lives more pleasant
and comfortable. Our species from the earliest periods of prehistory seems
compelled not just to survive, but to grow, progress, and enhance itself and
its environment. At each new level of our development, we endeavor to
master our environment as well as the physical dynamics governing our
Universe.
Humanity’s activities, including the entire scientific and technological
enterprise, represent a unified attempt by the species “humanness” to
everything we encounter. Over the centuries, we have labored to improve
planet Earth, and we are now preparing to transform the universe into a
dynamic entity filled with life. We will accomplish this by extending our
2
Nanotechnology is the creation and use of materials or devices at extremely small
scales.
105
consciousness, skills, intellect, and our very selves to other spheres. I would
like to label the sum total of our species’ endeavors to improve and change
our planetary environment, and ultimately the Universe itself: Vitalization.
Vitalization is a force that is conditioning human behavior. This drive to vitalize,
to imbue our planet and eventually the cosmos with a consciousness and
intelligence, is a primary motivation behind all human productive activity.
Vitalization is the primary force shaping human behavior. However, in order
to pursue vitalization successfully, the human species must master four other
forces. What I label the “building blocks of vitalization.” These four processes
encompass the extraordinary advances in areas such as space, medicine,
biogenesis, engineering, cybernetics, and energy:
1.
Dominionization; control over physical forces, such as energy, our ability
to manipulate matter, control fundamental aspects of the physical
universe, such as atom and electromagnetism, nanotechnology.
2.
Species Coalescence; unity through built systems, such as transportation
and communications, travel from Mumbai to New York in two hours,
universal communication network of images, voice and data is made
possible by satellites, fiber optics and other advanced technologies.
3.
Biogenesis; stem cell research, improvement of the physical shell, such
as through bioengineering, through genetic manipulation, cloning,
creating a new and improved human, smarter, smaller, more adroit, more
creative, nanomachines that cruise through patient’s body and fight
viruses like AIDS, Alzheimer’s, cancer and cystic fibrosis.
4.
Cybergenesis; interconnection with machines to advance human
evolution, enhancing the brain’s functioning, as a surrogate memory,
visualizer, calculator and decision maker, computer implant in the brain
to complement human memory and computational skills, enable the
human brain to connect to a computer and download and upload data.
Our species is guided by a sense of higher purpose, a destiny, as it were,
of which we are only now becoming aware. This new vision synthesizes a
century of scientific and theoretic research into the nature of the human
species and our ultimate place and role in the evolving universe. The
emergence of human consciousness and human intelligence is a unique
historical event, the human race’s capacity to vitalize, bring life, order,
creativity, and novelty to everything it touches, sets the world on a
completely new evolutionary trajectory. Moreover, the world now possesses
an entity, the human species that could develop tools to save the Universe from
106
the Big Chill or the Big Crunch, the demise augured by the Big Bang theory. Hence
human will is the ultimate determinant of the shape and direction of the
Universe. It will not be left to the Universe to determine its ultimate fate. It
has no concept of where it is going. At best, it will settle into a moribund
chaos, at worst it will teeter on the edge of dissolution and destruction. The
human being has a different destiny in mind for the cosmos. We are actively
engaged in creating a Human-Universe of our own. Such ruminations are
hardly esoteric or philosophical. Government and business leaders, if they
are to make correct long and short term decisions regarding technological
development and the economy, must understand the powerful role that the
human species will play in the future. Indeed, speculation about such cosmic
issues is becoming commonplace. Scientific discoveries by the Hubble
Space Telescope and the Mars Pathfinder mission only fuel the debate over
the place of man in the cosmos. Moreover, NASA has created an Astrobiology
Program to study the origin, evolution, distribution, and purpose of life in the
universe. This new vision provides startling answers to the questions: Why
us? Why here? Why now? We are entering a human future, in which the very
shape and direction of all aspects of the universe will be deeply influenced
by the actions of the human race and its descendants. For example, the
proposed terra-formation of Mars, the creation of an earthlike environment
on the Red Planet encompasses more than a planetary facelift. It will be our
destiny in space (IMAX movie). The vitalized future will be a human future,
reflective of our core values, growth, progress, optimism, hope, and altruism. The
very act of vitalization, the bringing of life to other worlds, implies that we
are acting through exclusively human values, the desire to improve our
surroundings, to enrich, embellish, and make the world a better place. While
human imagination and energy will build this new world, our values will
shape it.
Technologies and their uses should be limited and controlled by biblical
ethics, not by our desires for more power or wealth. The unquestioned pursuit
of technology could have unintended adverse consequences and should
therefore be limited. Many enlightened voices warn of the dangers of three
technologies: robotics, genetic engineering, and nanotechnology. Self
replicating nanotechnology could destroy all plant life. Genetic engineering
could result in a race of super-humans, ushering in a new era of inequality.
The key to understanding these new risks is the fact that these technologies
share one remarkable potential: that is, self-replication. We will have intelligent
Robots by 2030, Nano-replicators by 2020, and the Genetic Revolution is
already upon us. We all have a picture of what an intelligent robot might look
107
like. Hollywood has given us many stories of that kind of technology gone
wrong. These technologies could destroy everything including humanity.
History is filled with people who believed that they were racially superior to
others; Nazi Germany and Vedic Indian caste system are some of the obvious
examples. An aspect of human uniqueness is the belief that all people are
created equal and have rights endowed to them by their creator that cannot
easily be taken away. But what if it became overtly obvious that people are
not equal, that some, because they could afford new genetic therapy, could
have children that were brighter, stronger, and generally more capable than
anyone else? This is the question being asked by Francis Fukuyama in his
book “Our Post-human Future.” The answer he comes up with is not
comforting. He contends that technology is at hand to separate humans into
distinct genetic camps and that we will not hesitate to use it.
Fukuyama gives us three possible scenarios for the near future. First, he
points to the rapid acceptance and widespread use of psychotropic drugs
like Prozac and Ritalin as an indication that future mind altering drugs will
find a receptive market. What if neuro-pharmacology continues to advance
to the point where psychotropic drugs can be tailored to an individual’s
genetic makeup in order to make everyone happy, without the side effects
of the current drugs? It might even become possible to adopt different
personalities on different days, extroverted and gregarious on Friday, reserved
and contemplative for classes or work on Monday. Next, advances in stem
cell research might soon allow us to regenerate any tissue in the body. The
immediate result would be to dramatically extend normal human life
expectancy, which could have a number of unpleasant social and economic
implications. Finally, the feasibility of wealthy parents being able to screen
embryos before they are placed in the womb is almost upon us. It would be
hard to imagine parents denying their offspring the benefit of genetically
enhanced intelligence, or the prospect of living longer lives free from genetic
disease. What will happen to civil rights within democratic nations if these
predictions come true? Will we end up with a society split into subspecies
with different native abilities and opportunities? What if Europe, for instance,
is populated with relatively old, healthy, rich people and Africa continues to
suffer economic deprivation with a far younger population ravaged by AIDS
and other preventable diseases. Interestingly, Fukuyama believes that the
greatest reason not to employ some of these new technologies is that they would
alter what it means to be human, and with that our notions of human dignity.
The Christian basis for human dignity is the “Imago Dei,” the image of God
placed within us by our Creator. Many are questioning the wisdom of
108
chemical and genetic manipulation of humanity, even if it seems like a good
idea now.
There is a long tradition of looking at the surrounding world with suspicion.
Recent advances in science and technology are not making this struggle
any easier. In his work “The Abolition of Man,” C.S. Lewis argued that
humanity’s so-called power over nature “turns out to be a power exercised
by some men over other men with Nature as its instrument.” His concern is
that the modern omni-competent state combined with irresistible scientific
techniques will result in Conditioners who have full control over the future
of humankind. He feared that modernism and its ability to explain away
everything but “nature” would leave us emptied of humanity. All that would be
left is our animal instincts. The choice we have is to see humanity as a complex
combination of both material and spiritual components or else to be reduced
to machines made of meat ruled by other machines with nothing other than
natural impulses to guide them. Sociologist Jacques Ellul in his book “The
Technological society,” argues that as a society becomes more technological
it also becomes less interested in human beings. As he puts it, the technical
world is the world of material things. When it does show an interest in mankind,
it does so by converting him into a material object. Ellul warns that as
technological capabilities grow, they result in greater and greater means to
accomplish tasks than ever before, and he believes that the line between
good and evil slowly disappears as this power grows. Ellul worries that the
more dependent we become on technology and technique, the more it
conforms our behavior to its requirements rather than vice versa. Whether in
corporate headquarters or on military bases much has been written about
the de-humanizing effect of the employment of modern technique. Primarily,
he fears that even the religions might become enamored with the results of
technique. The result would be depending less on the power of God to
work through Spirit-filled believers and more on our modern organization
and technological skills.
Without a doubt, technology can help to make a society more productive,
and growing productivity is a major predictor for future increases in
standards of living. Likewise, technology results in greater opportunities to
amass wealth both as a society and for individuals. Communication
technology can help to unify a society as well as equalize access to
information and thus promote social mobility. On the other hand, technology
can cause harm to both the environment and individuals. The Chernobyl nuclear
power disaster in Russia and the Bhopal industrial gas tragedy in India resulted
in thousands of deaths due to technological negligence. The widespread
109
access to pornography over the internet is damaging untold numbers of
marriages and relationships. Terrorists have a growing number of inexpensive
technologies available to use against civilians including anthrax and socalled radioactive dirty bombs that depend on recent technological
advances. However, it must be said that most religions do not view
technology itself as evil. Technology has remarkable potential for expanding
the outreach of ministries and individuals. Probe’s, a Christian organization’s
website is accessed by close to 100,000 people every month from over one
hundred different countries. Modern communications technology makes it
possible to broadcast the Gospel to virtually any place on the planet around
the clock. However, in our use of technology, Christians need to keep two
principles in mind. First, we cannot give in to the modern tendency to define
every problem and solution in scientific or technological terms. Since the
enlightenment, there has been a temptation to think naturalistically, reducing
human nature and the rest of Creation to its materialistic component. The
Bible speaks clearly of an unseen spiritual world and that we fight against
these unseen forces when we work to build God’s kingdom on Earth.
Ephesians tells us “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the
rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against
the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” Scientific techniques
alone will not further God’s kingdom. We must acknowledge that prayer and
the spiritual disciplines are necessary to counter the adversary.
Second, we need to remember the power that sin has to tempt us and to mar
our thinking. We are to have dominion over the earth as God’s stewards, not
as autonomous tyrants seeking greater pleasure and comfort. Parents should
be allowed to make reasonable genetic enhancement in their children, claims
Ronald Bailey in the following viewpoint. Such enhancements will allow
people to live longer, healthier, and more successful lives, he contends.
Once the safety of genetic engineering is established, applying the
“reasonable-person standard,” asking whether a reasonable person would
consent to the genetic enhancement, will prevent parental abuse of the
technology. We are on the cusp of profound biological change, poised to
transcend our current form and character on a journey to destinations of
new imagination. Let’s assume that cheap, reliable genetic interventions will
be available to parents in the next couple of decades. One such technology
might involve inserting artificial chromosomes carrying genes selected by
parents into an embryo at the one-cell stage. Once the artificial chromosomes
have been incorporated into the embryo’s genome, the selected genes
would spread normally so that they would be in every cell of the enhanced
110
child’s body when he or she is born. So what type of genetic enhancements
would be morally acceptable? Again, applying a reasonable-person standard,
consent can be presumed for general capacities that anyone would want,
e.g., genes that tend to increase intelligence, strengthen immune systems,
and lengthen lives. After all, these are capacities that many other people
already have naturally, so it’s hard to see a moral reason for denying them to
others who will be able to obtain them safely by means of genetic
engineering. Opponents of genetic enhancement try to frighten the public
by trivializing the choices that parents might make. They suggest that some
parents will want to genetically engineer piano prodigies or professional
soccer players. Others insinuate Nazi Eugenics3 by hinting that some parents
will choose to endow their children with dark hair and blue eyes. Some have
even suggested that black parents might choose to endow their children so
that they will have white skin in order for them to avoid the pain of racism.
Although human beings are not perfect, they are good enough and do
not need enhancement. Human imperfection is what makes us human.
Moreover, using genetic enhancement to make us smarter more attractive
and immortal would appeal to humanity’s superficial desires. Genetically
enhancing children will leave humans as robots. Hopes of enhancement
and immortality are widely and superficially appealing, drawing on the
overpowering love we feel for our children and on our weakness for
technological consumerism. Advanced Cell Technology has predicted that
scientists soon will be able to add 20 or 30 IQ points to an embryo. But the
human mind may nonetheless be the apex of thinking machinery simply
because it is able to hold things in balance, to understand that more can be
too much and that are thresholds we don’t need to cross. All these reflect the
shallowest idea about human life, the sense that more is always better. In fact,
it is in our limitations that we find our meaning. An eternal robot might be nifty,
but it wouldn’t be human. If we are to stay on the human side of the future,
we also need a new understanding, one at least as revolutionary as the double
helix (structure of DNA), the understanding that as a species we are good
enough. Not perfect, but not in need of drastic redesign. We need to accept
certain imperfections in ourselves in return for certain satisfactions. Across
the sweep of history, we’ve managed to make our societies gradually but
steadily more humane, more caring. As individuals, at least in the Western
3
This ethnic concept of Germany was closely linked to an obsession with restoring
the biological purity of the race, known as the Aryan race, and the destruction of the
allegedly degenerate minorities.
111
world, we’ve managed to build long lives of general ease and comfort. We
don’t need to go post-human, to fast-forward our evolution, to change
ourselves in the thoroughgoing ways that the apostles of these new
technologies demand. We need not ban stem-cell research, but we should
regulate it so that it doesn’t raise the possibility of designer babies. A species smart
enough to discover the double helix should be wise enough to leave it more or less
alone. We hope that Homo magnificus will use science and technology to
balance the life and the world: we trust that he will make good choices. In
future, earth will even be more beautiful than it is today. The water will be
pure and deep, reflecting within itself the sunlight which gave life to all the
creatures beneath the waves. The earth will be greener with many kinds of
trees and plants. These will give food and shelter to the birds, the animals,
and to all mankind and to all yet to evolve. At night the air will be so clear that
the starlight gives a glow almost as bright as the moon. The people of the
earth will live close to nature. They understand and honor it and never take
more than what they need from it. The people will live in peace so they
prosper and begin to build many nations all around the world according to
nature’s climate. The whole creation will rejoice and celebrate with the
evolution of Homo mangificus, a new species on earth, where life proliferates
so abundantly on our planet.
Homo magnificus to Homo saliens:
Awareness – 14000 AD to 24000 AD
“You are salt of the Earth. But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor? Can you
make it salty again? It will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless.”
(Mathew 5:13)
How do I define Awareness? Religious teachers, including Jesus, the
Buddha, and many Hindu sages, are always telling us wake up—to be alert,
alive, awake, attentive, or aware. But what does this really mean? Being
conscious or aware means:
1.
I drop to a level deeper than the passing show.
2.
I become the calm seer of my dreams from that level.
3.
I watch myself compassionately from a little distance, almost as if the
“myself” is someone else, a “corpse” as St. Francis puts it.
4.
I disidentify with my own emotional noise, and no longer let it pull me
here and there, up and down.
5.
I stop thinking about this or that and “collapse into” pure consciousness
of nothing in particular. You don’t get there, you fall there. At first, it does
112
not feel like “me” and is even unfamiliar territory, because up to now I
thought my thinking was “me” yet now my thinking has ceased. This is
the accurate meaning of Jesus’ teaching on “losing oneself to find
oneself” (Lk 9:24).
The great biological revolutions mark the history of life in the world. The
first is the origin of life itself; the second, the origin of eukaryotic cells, cells
with nuclei: and the third, the origin of multicellular organisms. Each of these
revolutions transformed the world in dramatic ways. It is not an exaggeration
to add a fourth revolution: the origin of human consciousness. As we are unsure
how big a gap exists between a chimpanzee level of consciousness and our
own, we cannot be precise about a Homo habilis level of consciousness, or
a Homo erectus level of consciousness, the sense of self, the tendency to
attribute feelings to others, the facility to know the world better, and the raw
emotion of compassion, all were enhanced through time as the evolutionary
ratchet advanced. It represents a new dimension in biological experience.
Why should there even be the phenomenon of human consciousness? In
my approach to the human species, however, it is necessary to view
consciousness as we view other aspects of ourselves: the direct product of
natural selection. Many psychologists and linguists now argue that spoken
language is the loom on which some of the finer fabrics of consciousness are
woven. Natural selection would have worked with this, moving consciousness
to higher and higher levels. This gradually unfolding consciousness not only
fashioned a new kind of reality in our heads, it also changed us into a new
kind of animal. One thing we can sure about, however, is that once
consciousness passed the threshold of self-awareness and death awareness,
there welled up in the human mind the big questions: Why? What is the
meaning of my life? How does the universe come to be?
Consciousness, as a quality of mind, makes each of us feel special as an
individual, because the sense of self, by its nature, is exclusive of others. The
same quality has encouraged us, Homo sapiens to feel special in the world,
separate from and somehow above the rest of nature. The evolution of human
consciousness was the fourth biological experience: the self having become
aware of itself. With the birth of consciousness we have the urge to know, in
both tangible and intangible realms. One only has to look around at the
material world we inhabit, a world we created, to see the impact of human
consciousness on the world. Great science, great art, and great compassion,
each one of it is the product of consciousness, and also great arrogance.
Having been seduced into believing that we are indeed special in the world,
we have come to take an anthropocentric view of the world, and, for many
113
people, of the universe too. An anti-anthropocentric critic, perhaps a visitor
from a civilization far more advanced than ours, might point out that the
quality of consciousness of which we are so proud is in fact a fragile entity, a
cognitive illusion created by a few neuronal tricks in the midst of gray matter.
Colin McGinn suggests that, although we may not like the idea, the human
mind must have limits to what it can comprehend, and its own consciousness
may be one of these things beyond those boundaries. The limits of our
minds are just not the limits of reality. There must be realities beyond our
own in the universe, a phenomenon future generations may have to cope
with. Meanwhile, here on Earth, paleoanthropology teaches us that our reality
is rooted in our history, linked by other, different realities through an unbroken
chain of ancestors to an unconscious past.
Awareness of the presence of consciousness, the inner “I” in humans is
one of the biggest leaps forward, providing the needed confidence and
self-esteem, power to preserve, conserve, serve and save: armed with these
characteristics Homo saliens is all set to change the natural world! It will
never be the same again! As humans, we experience the ultimate expression
of this dimension of intelligence: the skills of foresight and manipulation, the
facility of imagination, the sense of self. Homo saliens can be also called Homo
religiosus. The readers of my previous book, “Earth-The Lost Paradise of
Happiness” would be familiar with the discussion on a German phrase
“Wissenschftliche Sitz im Leben” which means in English “The Scientific
Situation in Life.” When Jesus said, “You are the salt of the Earth”, he would
have very much concerned with salt’s scientific properties rather than
reducing it a mere parable, which was the result of the inability to
comprehend the intrinsic scientific meaning by the apostles and the writers
of the Bible. Hence, it is very proper to look in to the scientific, historic,
medical and spiritual importance of salt, before we venture in to the
theological, religious and human evolutionary importance. Every human
being, potentially endowed with incredible degree of potentialities, as we
journey toward the Omega Point, the terminal of our evolution and it could
be also called the goal of our existence. Even though it remains still elusive,
our next human transition could be deciphered from our ability of
coordinating the spiritual resources with our intellectual capabilities. Man
can become a powerful engine to drive everything he touches and confronts,
exerting everlasting imprint in the story of human evolution. Homo saliens is
in possession of awareness that he could transform and make a shift, resulting
in a big leap forward in human evolution. In this process he is compelled to see
an unbreakable connection around him with the natural world, thus his presence
is very vital and almost inert to the growth and development of everything as salt
114
becomes indispensable for all organisms. In short we can call in modern terms
“Homo saliens is a man of awareness.” Salt has lots of properties and essentials
for biological growth of animals and plants. Human body retains 3.5 % in
balance constantly equaling the same percentage of salinity in the seas. It is
found in solution in ocean water in concentrations of about 35 g/liter of
water, meaning that salt makes up about 3.5 percent of ocean water by
weight. Salinity is also an important measurement in oceanography. Salinity
and temperature measurements enable oceanographers to determine the
density of seawater. Small differences in density with depth or distance can
set water into motion, generating currents of the ocean surface. Salinity is
also an important measurement in biology because salt is dissolved in the
bodily fluids of all living things. The level of dissolved salts in a fluid controls
the biochemical process of osmosis4 and many metabolic processes.
“ V os estis sal tterr
err
ae
errae
ae””
In Latin (Vulgate), “Vos estis sal terrae,” means “You are Salt of the Earth.” The Bible
contains numerous references to salt. In various contexts, it is used metaphorically
to signify permanence, loyalty, durability, fidelity, usefulness, value, and
purification. It was also used as a component of ceremonial offerings, and as a unit
of exchange. You are the salt of the earth. Salt preserves from corruption. As the
disciples of Messiah we are to preserve the world from general corruption.
Whatever becomes utterly corrupted is doomed to be destroyed. Just like food left
out on the counter, our world is corrupt and doomed for destruction unless we do
something about it. Jesus appeals to the Jews of his time, to value religion as a
powerful tool for change and transformation. Homo religiosus should reflect the
characteristics of salt. There it is, Jesus’ disciples are sent into the world to be “the
salt” in the world. The renowned Baptist pastor, George Truett once said... “You are
either being corrupted by the world or you are salting it.” Salt was used as a figure
of speech in the ancient world of sparkling conversation, speech dotted with witty
or clever remarks. In Colossians 4:6, salt indicates speech which gives a flavor to
the discourse and recommends it to the pallet as well as speech which preserves
from corruption and renders wholesome. The Greeks called salt “charitas” (grace)
because it gave flavor to things. Our speech must not be corrupt (Ep.4;29) and salt
(God’s grace) holds back corruption. A thoughtless word of criticism, a questionable
remark, an angry word—any of these could tear down in a minute whatever
Christian testimony others have tried to build up. No believer ought ever to say,
“Now take this with a grain of salt!” Instead we need to put the salt into our speech
and our actions! May there be salt in every one of us, for “salt is good.” Have salt in
yourselves, and then you will become a blessing to all around you. When we wish
to stress a person’s solid worth and usefulness we often say “That person is the salt
of the earth,” and he is the man of religion: Homo religious.
4
Osmosis, in botany and chemistry, the flow of one constituent of a solution through
a membrane while the other constituents are blocked and unable to pass through the
membrane.
115
Salt has been a major item of commerce for millennia and is still traded
today in parts of Ethiopia. The Afar people mine bars of salt (amoles) from the
forbidding Danakil Depression and transport it to the highlands on camels
where it is traded as a valuable commodity. It’s the perfect business: the raw
material and the energy supply are both free, and almost infinitely abundant.
However there is something holy about salt, wrote Nathaniel Hawthorne (18041864)5 and certainly it contains an indisputable truth; sodium chloride may seem
the most mundane of substances, yet throughout history it has been accorded
special reverence. We are all aware of 24 carat gold but originally this term
was applied to salt. There was 5 carat salt and 10 carat salt and the grading
was based on dirt or ‘dross’ it contained. 24 carat salt was the most valuable
and purest form of salt, comparable to genetic, cultural and philosophical
variations in humanity. Salt runs through every aspect of daily life: from
cosmetics and clothing to gasoline and food. The common condiment has
been in use since the Neolithic times. Sodium is a necessary nutrient, one
that helps maintain proper water balance and blood pressure, as well as
stomach, nerve and muscle function, salt producers claim that there are
over 14,000 uses of salt. Besides its spiritual values, it has countless other
properties: curing of leather, glazing of pottery, restorative and antiseptic
uses, dyeing of fabric and preservation of meat. Salt is essential to luxurious
spas where stress is washed away and circulation recharged. The utilitarian
values of salt made it the first commodity of world trade. Salt’s healing,
restorative and antiseptic properties led to religious and social significance
being attributed to it by early people, hence it was valued. In the ancient
Semitic culture, salt symbolized trust and friendship and among the Jews all
pacts and treaties were negotiated at a table displaying a ceremonial container
of the compound, originating the term ‘Covenant of salt’ the eternal bond between
God and Israel. Ancient synagogues included a salt chamber. Bedouins still
use the phrase ‘there is a salt between us’ as an expression of affection and
Roman Catholic priests ritually sprinkle salt to exorcise dwellings inhabited
by spirits. In the past, priests would place a pinch of salt on a baby’s tongue
during Baptism and say, ‘Receive the salt of wisdom.’ Like any other essential,
salt was thought to have a supernatural origin and its place in religion and
civilization varies. In ancient Greek and Roman cultures it was used as a part
of offerings that were made to their gods. Rome’s major highway was called
Via Salacia (salt road) and soldiers used it to carry salt. Mexicans considered
it so valuable that they even worshipped a salt god! Homer called it divine,
and Plato described it as a ‘substance dear to the Gods.’
American novelist, whose works are deeply concerned with the ethical problems of
sin, punishment, and atonement.
5
116
Spilling salt brings bad luck is a popular superstition (borrowed from
Leonardo da Vinci’s painting: The Last Supper). The Swiss grooms used to
keep salt in one pocket and potato in the other to ensure his long married
life. The German bride used to put salt in her shoe. One of the most interesting
salt trades can be traced in the history of Gold Coast (Ghana), where Gold
was bartered for salt. The Arab merchants traveled across the desert with
enough salt to trade with, together with drummers and carriers. On reaching
Gold Coast, they stopped by the river and conveyed their arrival through
the drum beaters. The Ghanians took notice of this and prepared themselves
to exchange their gold with salt dust packed in their bags. Reaching ashore
they would find no man around and several piles of salt well spread over the
area (the Ghanians would not trade if anyone was there). Next, they would
neatly stack the gold dust, proportionally to the salt pile, and retreat. The
Arab traders would come back and shake their heads (there is not enough
gold) and once again return to their hiding place. The natives would arrive
with more gold to please their partners. The Arabs would return only when
the Ghanians had left the scene and would nod their heads and smile as if
there was enough gold for their satisfaction. The drum once again echoed in
the air and it symbolized the departure of the Arabs. Later the natives would
come back and carry off the precious salt. On returning to the village they
celebrated a feast to mark their success in trade. Salt came to be used as a
currency in landlocked kingdoms such as Tibet and Ethiopia. Marco Polo
noticed Tibetans using salt cakes stamped with the imperial seal of the great
Kublai Khan6 as money. And when Roman chronicler Petronius7 complained
that ‘man wasn’t worth his salt’ he was speaking literally. Roman soldiers
during the time of Julius Caesar received a quota of salt as part of their
wages, thus providing the root of the English word, salary. In fact Caesar
traveled with his team of ‘salinators’ who were skilled at preparing salt for the
soldiers. A Sanskrit proverb suggests that salt’s association with nobility was
due primarily to its top rank: “There are six flavors,” the saying went, “and of
them all salt is the king.” “Close by stands the Latin adage about things with a
grain of salt: cum grano salis, which began as an offhand compliment about
its virtues. Of course, today the words are observed in Historia Naturalis is
Pompey’s knowledge about salt … taken fasting, with a grain of salt added,
renders enemy poison harmless.”
6
Kublai Khan (1215-1294), Mongol military leader, founder and first emperor of the
Mongol Yuan dynasty in China, grandson of the Mongol conqueror Genghis Khan and
his best-known successor.
7
Roman writer, believed to have written Satyricon. Lived around 66 AD, his full name
was probably Gaius Perronius Niger. Because of his sense of luxury and elegance, Petronius
planned many of the entertainments at Nero’s court.
117
In Elizabethan times, entrants to university were asked to share a drink of
salt water as an initiation rite. “It is a true saying,” remarked Cervantes in Don
Quixote echoing a comment Cicero8 had made 17 centuries before, “that a
man must eat peck of salt
Don Quixote
with his friends before he
Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes published
knows him.” In 1785, the
the first part of his novel “Don Quixote” in 1605. It
Earl of Dundonald9 wrote
tells the story of an old man, Don Quixote, who
that every year “ten
imagines himself to be a young knight combating
thousand people are
injustice. The novel is regarded as one of the
greatest works in the world literature. Its hero is
seized for salt smuggling
generally seen as a universal symbol of idealists
and 300 men sent to the
on impossible quests for goodness.
gallows for contraband
trade in salt. Mined
(regular) salt and Solar (sea) salt come from different places. Salt originates
in the ocean, which has covered many parts of the Earth over time. Some
ancient seas dried up and were covered with sediment and this paved the
way for numerous salt deposits beneath the Earth’s surface. Salt comes in
various colors that they acquire from the conditions prevailing in the Earth’s
interior; particularly the clay and soil surrounding their water sources. It varies
from sparkling white-sea-salt, Fleur de sel from France and Portugal to Black
rock salts from India. In between there are shades of grey (Celtic varieties),
red (Hawaiian Alaea), pink (Peruvian pink salt). Fleur de sel or the flower of
salt is the most prized natural sea salt that comes from France and Portugal.
Here the Atlantic currents are cleaner and the climate is milder which renders
the low-lying areas suitable for salt harvesting. Only the top flaky crystals are
traditionally harvested (from May to September), packed and sealed under
the signature of the plaudier (salt raker) who harvested it. Fleur de sel is
unprocessed, unrefined and, of course, unadulterated salt. Besides the richness
of the sea it comes packed with potassium, calcium, magnesium, copper
and iodine. Food and health aficionados rate it as the finest salt available and
it is often referred to as the caviar of salt, or the pinnacle of sea salt. It makes
an excellent all round seasoning and is mainly used to finish a dish or to
compliment the salads where the sprinkled salt shines like little diamonds
from the sea. The diamonds are expensive and they come packed in small
quantities!
8
Cicero (106-143 BC), Roman writer, statesman, an orator. Although he had a
distinguished political career, he is best known as Rome’s greatest orator and as a
man of letters.
9
Lord Thomas Cochrane (1775-1860), he was the 10th Earl of Dundonald, statesman,
and British naval commander, known for his daring and successful career at sea.
118
Hawaiian Alaea sea salt is uniquely colored large crystals with a mellower
taste. The traditional sea salt of Hawaii is combined with iron rich island clay
which turns it reddish pink due to iron oxide. One gram serving of Hawaiian
Alaea sea salt contains 0.05 milligrams of iron. Whether it comes from the sea
or the Earth, table salt is made through the process of evaporation. In the case of
solar salt, sea water is put into shallow outdoor basins and allowed to evaporate
until salt crystals emerge. In mined salt, water is pumped into salt mines to
create a well of brine, which is then pumped into vessels and heated until
once again, salt crystals emerge. Impurities are filtered, iodine and anticaking agents are sometimes added, and finally we get table salt. Some
strange medieval prescriptions include the addition of cows’ or sheep’s
blood, egg white and ale to the boiling brine in order to ensure a wellgranulated salt. Besides distilling sea or salty water, our ancestors extracted
salt from various other sources including wood (when making charcoal with
saline wood), saline plants and lotus. In mountainous regions of China and
Korea, the inhabitants prepared sungyom or excellent salt by fermenting a
mountain herb called such’ae. The salt in use today is mostly produced from
sea water or from deposits of rock salt. An estimate suggests that if all the oceans
were to dry up, we would have large quantities of salt, about 15 times the size of
Europe. Imagine how much gold would have been required to barter this!
There is no international jury to decide whether food is ‘salty’ or ‘not salty’.
What is salty for one may not be salty for the other. The need for sodium
varies with the physiological requirements of individuals or societies.
However sodium levels can be determined from blood tests and accordingly
one can increase or decrease the intake of salt. People with high blood
pressure or heart ailments should limit their salt intake. Sodium levels take a
nosedive when you get angry, nervous, worried or fall in love. In such situations
salty food is an excellent remedy!
The real value of salt lies in its ability to make everything it touches taste
like itself. The real difficulty comes in trying to put the saltiness back into the
salt once it is gone. Obviously the job is impossible. That is why Jesus in this
analogy encouraged his disciples never to lose their salty flavor (see Matthew
5:13). Have salt in yourselves: always you live a kind of life that will attract
men to Jesus as they sense his goodness in the way you live. Build into your
life those Christ-like qualities that will make men taste Jesus whenever you
are around. Like salt, Homo saliens would exhibit a preservative influence on
society, rather than contribute to its disintegration by personal quarrels. H. saliens
is to be the preserving element that prevents our world from total corruption.
If the H. saliens is to bring flavor to society, then he must possess the special
qualities and characteristics of him. If he is tasteless, he is of no more value
119
than salt that has lost its qualities of being “salty.” Jesus used salt to illustrate
three qualities that should be found in his people: First, we should remember
God’s faithfulness, just as salt when used with a sacrifice recalled God’s covenant
with his people (Leviticus 2:13). A middle Eastern saying, ‘There is bread and
salt between us’, meant that a relationship had been confirmed by sharing a
meal. Salt symbolized the life and enduring nature of the alliance. In the Bible
salt appears in the relationship between God and Israel (Lev. 2:13). As a
purifying agent and preservative in the cereal offering, salt symbolized the
indissoluble nature of the covenant between God and Israel. An everlasting
‘covenant of salt’ (Numbers 18:19) was made between God and Aaron, who
represented the whole priesthood of Israel. Since the Levites received no
inheritance in the Promised Land, God himself was to be their special portion
forever. God’s covenant with King David and his sons was also called a
covenant of salt (2 Chronicles 13:5).
Second, H. saliens should make a difference in the “flavor” of the world we live
in, just as salt can change meat’s flavor (see Matthew 5:13). The most familiar
use of salt is as a seasoning. Salt is an essential constituent in the diet of
human beings and other warm-blooded animals. Certain peoples restrict
the consumption of salt, but they obtain necessary quantities of it by eating
salt-containing raw or cooked meat and fish. Common table salt marketed
for consumption in inland areas often has small quantities of iodides added
to prevent the occurrences of goiter.10 Wild animals often congregate at salt
streams or surface encrustations of salt, called salt licks, where they lick the
salt deposits. Salt is widely used as a preservative for meats and is employed
in some refrigeration processes, in dyeing, and in the manufacture of soap
and glass. For example, salt came mostly from salt marshes in the area
southwest of the Dead Sea. This impure salt was susceptible to deterioration
and could lose its flavor, leaving only useless crystals. Such salt was simply
thrown away. Jesus’ question, “How do you make it salty again?” did not
require an answer; for once salt has deteriorated nothing is left but worthless
residue. Many believers blend into the world and avoid the cost of standing
up for Christ. But Jesus says if H. saliens loses his distinctive “saltiness,” he
becomes worthless. Just as salt flavors the food, H. saliens has to bring new
flavor to life. This requires careful planning, willing sacrifice, and unswerving
commitment to the building of the Kingdom of God. Being “salty” is not easy, but
if H. saliens fails in this function, he fails to represent God in the world. The person
who is willing to hear should be able to understand these words and apply
them.
10
Goiter, disease of the thyroid gland, characterized by an enlargement of the neck.
120
Third, H. saliens should counteract the moral decay in society, just as salt
preserves food from decay. When he loses this desire to “salt” the Earth with the
love and message of God, he becomes useless to him. “Salt is good for seasoning,”
for in the ancient world salt was both a condiment and a preservative for
food. Jesus had said to the disciples, “You are the salt of the Earth” (Matthew
5:13). This implies that H. saliens has a particular function to perform on earth,
and that, if he fails to perform it, he might as well not exist. In what respect he
is said to be salt is not specified, so the nature of his function has to be
inferred from the context and from what is known of the effect of salt. They
may be intended to have a preserving and purifying effect on their fellows, or to
add zest to the life of the community, or to be a force for peace. The idea of an
insipid H. saliens ought to be a contradiction in terms. One way in which the
quality of saltiness can be manifested is in one’s language. ‘Let your speech be
always glorious, seasoned with salt’, Paul writes to the Colossians (Col. 4:6).
They were to be life-producing agents in a dying world; they were to be
preservatives in a world spoiled by sin. Jesus stressed the responsibility of each
believer toward God. Homo saliens will be held accountable by God to
maintain their “saltiness” (that is, their usefulness) by maintaining a close
relationship with him. Finally, the disciples were told to have the qualities of salt
and hence, they are known as Homo saliens. They must allow God’s purifying
work to be done in them. They, in turn, would be purifying agents in the
community and in the world. The result, then, would be peace with each
other. If the H. saliens had the “salt” in themselves, then they would not be
arguing about who would be the greatest in Christ’s Kingdom (9:34). They
must not allow the salt within them to be made useless by their wrangling
over position and concerns of this world. Instead, they must serve Christ;
then they would be doing their duty in the world and be at peace with each
other. The concept of ‘servum servorum’ would be best understood during
this period of time. H. saliens would put emphasis more on service than on
institutional authority. Hence all the power-hungry-religions would be
perceived as uncivilized therefore will be excommunicated, this time by
people and they have no place in this peaceful, graceful, Christ-filled and
the egalitarian times of H. saliens. In short we can call H. saliens in modern
terms as: Man of Awareness.
Like the properties of the salt man has unveiled an enormous amount of
capabilities and potentialities of a still evolving species and make him: a
man of awareness. All these qualities and gifts are at work and man is aware
that he is the salt of the Earth and drive the human species toward one goal;
Image of God. A fine example of awareness is Buddhism, which developed
121
out of the faith of Hinduism, is a religious faith which combines an emphasis
on detachment from the world with a heightened awareness of life. Life is
summarized in the Four Noble Truths of the faith: suffering is universal; desire
leads to suffering; suffering can, therefore, be cured by doing away from
desire; and this can be accomplished by following the Noble Eightfold Path,
which in turn leads to Nirvana. The steps of the Path are right knowledge,
right intention, right speech, right conduct, right livelihood, right effort, right
mindedness, and right concentration. In this brief outline is found the
framework of the Buddhist faith. So Buddhist teachings, besides the Christian,
could be one of the principle sources, which could give rise to Homo saliens.
The question motivating this subject is this: What inexplicable forces govern
or direct our lives? What moves us to take one direction one day, and another
direction on the next day? Is the answer chance? Is it psychology, physics, or
Shamanism? Is it Genetics, your dreams, outer events in the human world, or
the cosmos? To answer these questions, we liberally borrow from physics,
psychology and from our personal experience with earth-based, aboriginal
beliefs and Shamanism. Earth-based Psychology defines, explores, and
applies a relatively new and fundamental concept: path awareness. To explain,
experience, and understand our inherent direction-finding ability (same as
the seasoning and preserving abilities of salt) we had to cross the conventional
borders of various disciplines. Physics focuses mainly upon material
experimental proof and is just beginning to explore subjective experience.
Shamanism is mainly concerned with altered states of consciousness and
community. The practice of psychology deals mainly with the emotional
and functional problems of human life. We shall move into thinking and
feeling, using the rational mind as well as altered states of consciousness that
sense the Earth. Our goal is to develop directional consciousness or path
awareness, show that it is basic to an earth-based psychology, and apply it to
the solution of personal problems, and relationships, organizational, and world
issues.
Path awareness is actually an ancient concept. Linked to the universe,
our bodies sense direction in ways that merge our personal psychology
with the real and imaginary nature of the earth around us. Aboriginal peoples
have spoken about path of awareness in terms of the gods of the four
directions and the geometry of sand paintings. Einstein spoke of the mind of
God and the geometry of space-time. Psychology too, will soon speak, more
about the directional wisdom of the earth. Our psychology is intimately
linked not only to disembodied dreams and feelings, but also to the nature
of space and to the manner in which our bodies relate to this magical planet.
122
In a way, psychology is an aspect of cosmology. Earth-based psychology
will show how our deepest feelings can be expressed as mathematical
patterns linked to earth-based directions. Path awareness is the natural
inheritance, the birthright of every human being. Path awareness is an
updated form of earth-based spiritual paradigms. All of our aboriginal peoples
speak about moving according to the directions of a living planet: a sentient
earth. To find the magical paths of heart and of least action, we must develop
our awareness, must become a better observer of what happens inside and
outside. The purpose of earth-based psychology is to help us find and experience
what has been before us, why we have come into being, and where our lives are
flowing. Three thousand years ago the ancient Chinese Taoists may have
been more at ease speaking of the ungraspable. They did not speak about
awareness, consciousness, self-reflection, but rather of a Tao, or Way, that
could be described, and another Tao that could not be described. According
to the basic Tao Te Ching11 a sage simply knew the way, the Tao: she simply
had the kind of path awareness that could not be said, that was pre-verbal.
At some primal level we all are aware of directions before we can explain
what they mean for us. We feel motivated to move in a certain direction
before we know exactly why. We feel best in certain spots and less well in
others. Without knowing how, we are sentiently aware of tendencies to move
before we even move. In a way, the direction that we take, the path that we
can describe, is not the entire path. The real path was preceded by sentient
awareness of the earth, an awareness we can barely speak of. In reality we are
located in our bodies. But at the same time, we are also located, though nonlocally, at other places on earth and in the universe. In a way, we are the
directions. We are the area around ourselves. In a sense we are the earth; we
are the universe looking at itself. There is definitely something widespread,
something non-local, about our most sentient awareness. In other words,
what we call our awareness may not be entirely located in our own bodies.
This non-locality of awareness may be why researchers cannot find
consciousness located in the brain. From the view point of our experience,
awareness is non-local; it is everywhere. Our awareness is not ours alone. Nonlocal awareness may have been better developed in our ancestors. Needing
to find their way around at night without maps or street lamps, they depended
upon an awareness that they sensed was not located only in their bodies.
Our ancestors felt that the earth is a gigantic sentient being subjected to the same
forces we are. The very earth possesses awareness; this very earth is a living being
11
Legendary founder of Taoism (around 570 BC), a philosophy and religion of China.
123
of which we are a part (Gaia Theory).12 By moving with the sentient awareness,
we align ourselves with the direction in intends for us. Our sentient awareness
belongs at the same time to the entire earth, to the universe in which we live.
It is awareness that makes us look up at the night sky. Then the nonlocality of awareness breaks into parts as we stare at the universe. It is as if the
universe looks through us at its own taint. When we look up at the sky, we are
looking backward in time, at our tail, for it takes starlight a long time to reach
us. When we look at the night sky, then we look at the history of the universe.
Sentient awareness is a kind of intelligence, knowingness, a quantum mind.
Sentient awareness is physical and spiritual, gravitational and psychological.
Like aboriginal myths, the Bible also shows a kind of sentient awareness
appearing in the form of a God who created the world through reflecting
himself in human beings. Frescoed by Michaelangelo on the ceiling of Rome’s
Sistine Chapel, the creation of Adam shows a God emerging from the heavens
and, with a touch, giving a human being life. Among other things,
Michaelangelo’s painting symbolizes how sentient body awareness, god’s
subtle touch that comes from the universe’s awareness reflects and creates
human existence. Sentient awareness gives us our first principle of human
functioning: all experiences arise out of or is preceded by sentient awareness.
From sentience also come other methods, skills, and principles, the experience
of wonder and curiosity, for instance, and the ideas of process as teacher and
the path awareness. How you formulate these derived terms depends upon
who you are, your culture, your state of mind, the times you live in. Some use
cultural or religious frameworks; others, biology, sociology, or physics. Finally
Homo saliens can able to understand and see clearly, for the first time in
human evolution that he was responsible for all those years of war, violence,
environmental degradations, habitat destructions and disastrous
consequences of technology and development. This is the finest moment
of human history in which Homo saliens bends his knee for forgiveness and
realigns his life with new set of paradigms that would guide his destiny
toward a sustainable world. “I am building my expectation of a new phase in
human affairs upon the belief that there is a profoundly serious minority in the
mass of our generally indifferent species. I cannot understand the existence of
any of the great religions. I cannot explain any fine and grave constructive process
in history, unless there is such a serious minority amidst our confusions. They are
the Salt of the Earth, these people capable of devotion and of living lives for remote
and mighty ends,” wrote H. G. Wells.
12
The theory pioneered by James Lovelock, maintains that Earth is an interrelated
system in which this system functions with Earth’s surface and atmosphere. In short Gaia
theory says that the Earth is a super-organism.
124
Homo saliens to Homo illuminans – 24000 AD to 150,000 AD
“You are the Light of the World.” (Mathew 5:14)
It is not only the ability of each and every individual to shine subjectively,
but on the other hand it’s the ability of each and every individual to be able
to see that shining in other people. Finding ‘enlightenment’ is one of the
biggest shifts in the history of the universe and especially in human evolution:
that is what Homo illuminans is all about. We need to apply “Wissenschaftiche
Sitz im Leben” also for “light” and thereby we could understand all its
scientific implications of enlightenment. Light, form of energy visible to the
human eye that is radiated by moving charged particles. Scientists have
learned through experimentation that light behaves like a particle at times
and like a wave at other times. The particle-like features are called photons.
Photons are different from particles of matter in that they have no mass and
always move at the constant speed of about 300,000 km per second when
they are in a vacuum. When light diffracts, or bends slightly as it passes
around a corner, it shows wavelike behavior. The waves associated with light
are called electromagnetic waves because they consist of changing electric
and magnetic fields. Man is literally made up of stardust and hence, he can
shine like a star. Remember Jesus saying “You are the light of the world.” It is
just a time before man realizes that he is able to shine and he is aware of that!
This awareness brings us to the next stage in human evolution: Enlightenment.
I’m not interested here about the age of Enlightenment which refers to the
18th century in European philosophy, art, poetry and is often thought of as
part of a larger period which includes the age of reason.
What does it mean to experience, “Enlightenment”? Enlightenment is a
continuous realization that you are an eternal being who will never die. It comes
from a deeper knowing that you are beyond body and behind the mind. It is
celebrating every moment of the day with the feeling of being intimately
connected to the entire Universe, as if it is a living, breathing, conscious intelligence
that loves you unconditionally. It is surrendering to this truth everywhere you
are. Enlightenment is a process of peeling back the many layers of the ego
to experience your true radiant infinite Self. It is a process of opening to your
innermost being, and as result to the entire Universe! Reaching towards the
center of “you” you may find a spiritual cyclone (like Energy from the Planet’s
Core). Yet, keep diving, beyond that there is a deep stillness. In the very
essence of your being is where your true spiritual knowledge resides. This is
the source of your reality and Universe. As you continuously rest deeper into
the quiet peaceful still center in the heart of your being, you will eventually
125
awaken to the Divine being you truly are: Homo illuminans. The longer you
can abide in this center, the faster you’ll find yourself manifesting a rich life,
full of depth, meaning, clarity, love and abundant with bliss. Look inside at
your Infinite Nature! There exists a divine energy inside you that is connected
to the Infinite Source of the Universe. This source is always available to you,
if you are open to it. The moment you have a tiny glance of your infinite
nature, you see that you are the image of God. You are the source of love
itself. There is nothing greater than knowing this. In Bible we come across a
similar experience, when Jesus showed his true self in the “Transfiguration
Sequence”, where the disciples wanted to continue with the experience,
not to stop (Mathew 17:1-8).
There is before you and each soul on earth, a path to awakening to the
pure potential of Christ’s light that resides within your heart-space. This light
is most notable in those who are beginning to awaken during this most
chaotic time period on earth. (You are the Light of the World-Jesus) It is
applied here by our Lord to his disciples only as they shine with his light
upon the world, in virtue of his Spirit dwelling in them, and the same mind
being in them which was also in Christ Jesus. Christians are said to ‘shine’, not
as ‘lights’, but as luminaries in the world. As light attracts people and dispels
darkness, so H. illuminans were to illumine the way to God, the true source of
light. The doing of good works was a form of that light. Good works would
inspire others to believe in and glorify God. What this means is that those
who are on earth at this time to recognize their divinity are here for good
reason, for they hold the light packets and the infinity codes within their DNA
and genetic wiring for complete transmutation of lower vibrations. The
dormant aspects of our current biology offer us the ability to step outside of
our limited perceptions of self and the life around us to realize the beauty of
interconnectivity and oneness that surrounds us. This is why we are on earth
at this special time. This is why we have chosen to awaken at this particular
stage of earth’s evolutionary journey. Our purpose on this earth is none other
than to awaken to the beauteous splendor of who we really are? The result
would be the Enlightened: Homo illuminans. Stepping into this role is one that
requires a shedding of the old and outworn paradigms of life to begin to
realize that there is more than the human eye can see and the human heart
can dream. This space is one that we have implanted within before our
incarnation here and it is the work of our souls to guide us to this remembering.
In this time in earth’s history there is the potential for a complete and total
resurrection of the body of this planet and therefore, the inhabitants upon it.
Stipule talking about Baptism comments, “We die and rise to new life.” So
126
then, what is our special part? What we would like to provide with is an
understanding of how the genetic aspects of human construction, works to
assist in awakening the H. illuminans.
There, in the space of what we call the earth dimensions are frequencies
or codes that are written into geometric grid systems of light and intelligence
and connect each human to a level of understanding of perceptual reality.
This grid system works to incorporate all the levels of cosmic and stellar
activity within the physical embodiment of a soul. The purpose then, of
these grid systems is to allow for each individual to grasp the information
and consciousness of a particular field for the purpose of individual and
collective awareness and experience the tangible dimensions of earth. Our
role then in this grid system is to connect with and incorporate the light that
is emanating from these electromagnetic fields as they relate to you, to
restore, rebalance and re-calibrate our human form (a new creation). When
this has been achieved, those who are ready to walk into the new and higher
vibrations on Earth will be prepared and well suited as they will have been
guided by these unseen forces to their destiny. This is the genetic and
energetic perspective. The spiritual or perspective of awareness is that one
must be in a state of complete clarity and harmonic balance to achieve the
level of trust and knowingness necessary to employ the missions of the soul.
This state of clarity is one that is achieved by the letting go of preconceived
notions of what is, what was, and what will be, to allow for the truth to become
and allow the light to shine. This path is one that was set into motion by us and
therefore only we can take ourselves to the infinite. Taking ourselves to
infinite is merely a process of allowing ourselves the greatness of who we
are? We say surrender as a form of allowing, yet surrender is often an active
pursuit. Jesus surrendered himself to the will of the Father, his surrender
brought salvation and Jesus became the source of eternal life and he was
able to say with confidence that “I am the Light of the world!” (John 8:12). To
surrender, one must be in an active role of participation with the soul, and in
complete faith. Faith is the only pathway to the truth of who you are is not to
be found in your thoughts, but in the experiences of the heart. The state of
mind that humans created with thoughts of separation is actually the state of
mind that must be transcended to affirm the before mentioned truth. Once
this state of mind has been realized, you are then in a position to understand,
with clarity and by visceral experience, the truth of your being. This is the
space to not only realize your innermost desires and passion, but to begin to
put them in motion. The questions that reside in the human heart are there
for good reason, to remind you that you are more than you “think” you are.
127
Allowing this light of truth to descend upon us is paramount to our
fulfillment. Those who honor these questions of the heart are those who
courageously step on the path and claim their true power as conscious cocreators, capable of divine fulfillment and infinite joy. The version of oneself
is what will bring him into total harmony and balance through experience,
and will allow him to express that which is unexpressed. We will come to
know what we long for as we allow life to lead us. Most often this requires a
mere shift in consciousness, for one cannot think their way to salvation.
Experience is neither good nor bad, it is only what you perceive it to be, so
allow for experience to alter you and you will benefit greatly. A human life
has the potential for ultimate peace, love and joy, but to achieve this, one must be
the blend of such balance. This balance is especially important in relationships
for relationships require that one give and receive equally. In order to give, one
must have; in order to receive, one must allow. This balance is a natural by
product of intimate relationships especially, and is achieved through the
before mentioned experiences of the heart. When one allows for the light to
enter the heart-space, you are the energy pack. This allowing is what manifesting
is made of, synchronicities that form as a basis to living a life with ease. Often,
the human ego will block these miracles by interjecting with thoughts of
doubt and feelings of powerlessness as a result of a hardened heart which
blocks the love that already surrounds you. Heal your heart of all that no
longer serves your vision of life and the love that is already yours will come
into plain view. The human being was designed to create. So then, what will
you create with your infinite power? What will you attract with your limitless
potential through the formless substance of creation? We say, uncover and
be who you are in truth and you will attract all that you are by default and
truth will set you free. Blessings and miracles are bestowed upon you always,
but only if you allow for them. You can feel safe to let go, many are waiting to
escort you to your destiny. These soul-mates will appear when you are ready
to allow and receive them.
The universe is a conscious field of energy that is constantly supporting
you in awakening to knowing the truth. Nothing that happens is by accident.
Even your decision to read this is not an accident. Each experience you have in life
is the “right” experience. Every lesson you are here to learn is being provided
to you through these experiences. The universe is constantly giving us
assistance. In a single moment, in one stroke, you can become enlightened.
It is not a gradual process, because enlightenment is not something that you have
to invent. It is something that you have to discover. It is already there. It is not
something that you have to manufacture. Close your eyes and see it there. Be
128
silent and have a taste of it. Your very nature is what I call enlightenment. It is not
something alien, outside you. It is not somewhere else in time and space. It is
you, your very core. Your problems and issues in life are like particles of sand
between our toes, depending how you move through life they either grind
or massage your feet. Your problems are your greatest teachers in disguise.
Explore your life with a childlike curiosity. Life has a greater wisdom for you
than you can conceive of because the entire world is designed to awaken,
enlighten, heal and empower you. Everything is connected to a cosmic
intelligent web of energy, love and information in between every atom in
this universe. An exponentially increasing flow of amazing enlightening
insights will happen to you the moment you let go and dive deeper into
trusting this infinite source of intelligence. When you do, you’ll notice your
body becomes very relaxed, empty, soft and open to almost every possibility
that comes its way. Supreme states of bliss are happening to people all over
this planet right now.
As society opens to the Holy Spirit she will enable possibilities undreamed
of even by science and technology. A new spirit-based society based on
the profound experiences of pioneers of consciousness is a real possibility
(Homo illuminans). Newly evolved individuals centered in the Spirit will
usher in a Enlightened Life on earth. Human progress in consciousness can
usher in a new divine life on earth. When we discover our higher nature we
take an essential step to creating the Spirit-Based Societies on earth. As
humans evolve beyond their higher mental capacities they enter the plane
of the Spirit. If enough individuals gain the skills, knowledge, and powers of the
spiritual plane, then there is also the possibility of the new Enlightened Societies.
People are en masse becoming aware of the subtle unfolding of life. Many
are coming to understand the phenomena in Natural World. They express
the fact that we can instantly change the conditions of life around ourselves
from within. e.g., you change an attitude, or aspire for something intensely,
and then within days, hours, minutes, even seconds good fortune arrives on
its own. This is being accompanied by other propensities, as we embrace
higher human values, we begin to change and evolve our nature. Then there
are the pioneers who are opening to the spiritual force, which brings the
conditions of life under control, while evoking results that are dynamically
creative and unprecedented in quality. All of these are steps on the road to
enlightenment, the spiritual awakening of humanity. It is the promise of a
New World emerging from the turbulent old world (PDR Code)13. The source
13
PDR is the abbreviated form for Passion, Death and Resurrection. It is theory that
the cosmos follows PDR Code, as it undergoes change through destruction, extinction,
proliferation and speciation.
129
teachings of the great religions of the world are available to each of us
without having to follow that teacher exclusively. Jesus brought love to the
world, but we can follow the path of true Self-Giving without following
Christianity. We can perceive that attachment and possessiveness, ignorance,
and ego are essential causes of suffering, something Buddha professed,
without having to follow the religion that arose after his passing. We can
surrender to the True Self within and the Divine Reality above in the activities
of life without having to follow Krishna who professed that profound teaching
in his time and are several of the central precepts of Hinduism. We can
embrace the fact that evolution is constantly occurring in life without
exclusively becoming proponents of the works and principles of Darwin.
Thus in the modern era, we have made great advances in our mentality in
the past hundred years or so, we are able to perceive the variety of truths
from all time and traditions, as well as new, modern insights, and integrate
them in new holistic and uniquely perceptive integral views of reality. That
is one reason that the current era is referred to as “The New Age.”
It is a dynamic period in which we are able to develop a fresh, new
perspective of existence, including the knowledge gleaned from multiple
cultures; the various paths of wisdoms from a variety of traditions; the vast
array of material, psychological, and spiritual insights from around the world
and meld them into a comprehensive view of existence. There are many
signs that we are moving towards the new integral view of life. We see
nations forging closer political and economic ties and alliances; we see the
embracing of one another’s cultures; we see the communications of a
plethora of beliefs and spiritual teachings over the internet; we see a society
more open to new ideas that go beyond one’s traditional culture. This crosspollination of wisdom and personal experience is enriching the world and
every individual in it. It is surely a sign of humanity’s progress, which I believe
is in fact a New Awakening, a first step towards Homo illuminans; the Vatican
Document on the Constitution on the Church, “Lumen Gentium” calls this
reality as “Unity in Diversity.” How does the Church, the Body of Christ grow
and continue to survive? The Second Vatican council in its document the
Light of the Peoples recalls “as often as the sacrifice of the Cross is celebrated
on the altar, the work of redemption is carried out. At the same time in the
sacrament of the Eucharistic bread, the Unity in Diversity of the faithful, who
form one body in Christ, is expressed and brought about.”
Homo illuminans and his characteristics could be more understood in
the liturgy of the Holy Week. Even though we are not yet become H.
illuminans, yet we have all the possibilities packed in us. We are yet to realize
130
it! During the Easter Vigil14 the Church points out the significance of this day
principally through three symbols: light, water and the new song: The Alleluia.
First of all, there is light. God’s creation, which can be found in the biblical
narrative; it begins with the command: “Let there be light!” (Genesis 1:3). Where
there is light, life is born! Chaos can be transformed into cosmos. In the biblical
message, light is the most immediate image of God: he is total Radiance, Life,
Truth, Light. During the Easter Vigil, the Church reads the account of creation
as a prophecy. In the Resurrection, we see the most sublime fulfillment of
what this text describes as the beginning of all things. God says once again:
“Let there be light!” the Resurrection of Jesus is an eruption of light. Death is
conquered, the tomb is thrown open. The Risen one himself is light: the light of
the world. With the Resurrection, the Lord’s Day enters the nights of history.
Beginning with the Resurrection, God’s light spreads throughout the world
and throughout history, the day dawns. This light alone: Jesus Christ is the
true light, something more than the physical phenomenon of light. He is
pure light: God himself, who causes a new creation to be born in the midst of
the old, transforming chaos into cosmos. Let us try to understand this little
more better. Why is Christ light? In the Old Testament, the Torah 15 was
considered to be like the light coming from God for the world and for
humanity. The Torah separates light from darkness within creation, that is to
say; good from evil. It points out to humanity the right path to true life. It
points out the good, it demonstrates the truth and it leads us towards love,
which is the deepest meaning contained in the Torah. It is a ‘lamp’ for our feet
and a ‘light’ for our path (Psalm 119:105). Christians, then, knew that in Christ,
the Torah is present: the word of God is present in him as person. The word of
God is the true light that humanity needs. This word is present in him, in the Son.
Psalm 119 had compared the Torah to the sun which manifests God’s glory
as it rises, for the whole world to see. Christians understand: yes indeed, in
the Resurrection, the Son of God has emerged as the light of the world.
Christ is the great light from which all life originates, including Homo
illuminans. He enables us to recognize the glory of God from one end of the
Earth to the other. He points out our path. He is the Lord’s day which, as it
grows, is gradually spreading throughout the earth. Now, living with him and
for him, we can live in the light.
In the Roman Catholic Church the most solemn Easter service is the vigil observed
on the night of Holy Saturday. The vigil includes the blessing of the new fire, the procession
of the paschal candle, scripture reading, and often Baptisms.
15
Torah means in Hebrew ‘law or doctrine’, in Judaism, it is also known as the
Pentateuch especially when in the form of a parchment scroll for reading in the
synagogue. The Torah is the cornerstone of Jewish religion and law.
14
131
At the Easter Vigil, the Church represents the mystery of the light of
Christ in the sign of the paschal candle, whose flame is both light and heat.
The symbolism of light is connected with that of fire: radiance and heat,
radiance and the transforming energy contained in the fire: truth and love
go together. The paschal candle burns, and is thereby consumed: Cross and
Resurrection are inseparables. From the Cross, from the Son’s self-giving, light is
born, true radiance comes into the world. From the paschal candle we all light
our own candles, especially the newly baptized, for whom the light of Christ
enters deeply into their hearts in this sacrament. The early Church described
Baptism as ‘fotismos’, as the sacrament of illumination, as a communication of
light, and linked it inseparably with the Resurrection of Christ. In Baptism, God
says to the candidate: “Let there be light!” The candidates are brought into the
light of Christ. Christ now divides the light from the darkness. In him we
recognize what is true and what is false, what is radiance and what is darkness?
With him, there wells up within us the light of truth, and we begin to understand.
On one occasion when Christ looked upon the people who had come to
listen to him, seeking some guidance from him, he felt compassion for them,
“because they were like sheep without a shepherd” (Mark 6:34). Amid the
contradictory messages of that time, they did not know which way to turn.
What great compassion he must feel in our own time too, on account of all
the endless talk that people hide behind, while in reality they are totally
confused. Where must we go? What are the values by which we can order
our lives? The values by which we can educate our young, without giving
them norms they may be unable to resist, or demanding of them things that
perhaps should not be imposed upon them? He is the light.
The baptismal candle is the symbol of enlightenment that is given to us in
Baptism. Thus at this hour, St. Paul speaks to us with great immediacy. In the
letter to the Philippians, he says that, in the midst of a crooked and perverse
generation, Christians should shine as lights in the world (2:15). Let us pray to
the Lord that the fragile flame of the candle he has lit in us, the delicate light
of his word and his love amid the confusions of this age, will not be
extinguished in us, but will become ever stronger and brighter, so that we,
with him, can be people of the day, bright starts lighting up our time. Our call
is to become “Homo illuminans.” St. Paul recalls in Ephesians 4:4-6, “You are a
chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people set apart that you may
proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His wonderful
light.” We all have the ability to shine and our awareness adds confidence to
our belief. Many people know that they are able to perceive this truth, but at
the same time they are unable to perceive the same in others. The man of
132
light, most importantly should able to see the light in others and then he
should be able to say to the other, “You are the light of the world.” So far no
one has the confidence to say the same to others. Only one had the ability to
see the light in him and also the light in others: Jesus Christ. This is the reason
why he can say loud and clear, “You are the light of the world.”
Homo illuminans to Homo novus:
New Man - 150,000 AD to 850, 000 AD
Christ is the new man and through him all believers are new men (Eph. 2:15).
We need to have a vast amount of time lapse for the emergence of
Homo novus and time is the key! We need Homo novus, because something
is lacking and not fully right with the old human species. The enlightened
effect makes H. illuminans to see the new potentialities hidden in his soul,
and at the same time increases the desire for divine nature. Remember the
same old longing of our first parents from the Garden of Eden to become
God! The same story is repeated in every Eon, in every Age, in every Period
and in every Epoch! The Eden’s longing was motivated by arrogance and
curiosity but the Homo novus longing is motivated by desire for perfection,
spiritual quest and fulfillment. We cannot get rid of the old evil nature without
putting on a new nature. The transition of Homo novus must follow two
specific actions:
(A). There would be a spiritual renewal of his thoughts and attitudes, resulting
from the vast amount of spiritual, scientific and cosmic resources. For the first
time in the history of human evolution, Homo novus would be the first human to
understand right connection between science and religion which was elusive and
contradicting each other for a very long time. As a result for first time in human
evolution Homo novus would understand God more precisely than any
other previous species, due to the enlargement of his brain size, perhaps
inspired by more revelations, enacted by more salvations and redemptions,
certainly guided by the power of the Holy Spirit. By this time, I believe
Homo novus would have contacted the extra terrestrials, the exchange of
Scriptures, sciences, thoughts and exciting ideas between them would speed
up the charting up of Omega Point, thereby anticipating the celebration of
Cosmic Liturgy!16 The exchange of intelligence between them could zero in
the hiding place of God! He would find perfect answers with ease for all the
Celebration of spiritual homecoming of whole creation, where God is the main
celebrant and creation becomes the co-celebrant.
16
133
questions which besiege our Popes, theologians and philosophers. His rockets
would have explored even mapped hell, heaven and purgatory, and his
GPS17 would aid tourists in guided tours of the above places. Great theologians
like Thomas Aquinas, Augustine and Anselm would look just like kindergarten
kids if you compare them with H. novus. This kind of transformation begins in
the mind and results in renewed behavior. How is to be renewed in our
thoughts and attitudes? First, we must be involved in activities that renew our
minds which will give us peace within (Philippians 4:8-9). If one is to have this
inner peace from God and maintain a life free of worry, then certain steps
must be taken, notably in his or her thoughts. This list describes what should
pervade their minds. Homo novus should fix his thoughts on things that are:
1. True – Homo novus is a man of truth. Truth includes facts and statements
that are in accordance with reality (not lies, rumors, or embellishments),
sincere (not deceitful or with evil motives), and loyal, faithful, proper,
reliable, and genuine. Truth is a characteristic of God.
2. Honorable – Homo novus has matters which are worthy of respect,
dignified, and exalted in character or excellence.
3. Right – Homo novus would have thoughts and plans that would meet
God’s standards of rightness. They are in keeping with the truth; they are
righteous.
4. Pure - Homo novus should be free from contamination or blemish; unmixed
and unmodified; wholesome. Probably it could be moral purity, often
very difficult to maintain in thoughts.
5. Lovely - Homo novus would possess the thoughts of great moral and
spiritual beauty, not of evil.
6. Admirable – Homo novus would be considered as admirable. Things that
speak well of the thinker—thoughts that recommend, give confidence
in, afford approval or praise, reveal positive and constructive thinking.
The thoughts of Homo novus, if heard by others, should be admirable,
not embarrassing.
7. Excellent – Homo novus ways would be excellent. His actions are of moral
excellence; nothing of substandard quality.
8. Worthy of Praise – Indeed, Homo novus is New Creature and claims worthy
of praise. This phrase may be restated as “anything that deserves the
thinker’s praise” or “anything that God deems praiseworthy.”
17
Global Positioning System (GPS), space-based radionavigation system, consisting
of 24 satellites and ground support.
134
And second, Homo novus’s desire to pattern themselves after God, not the
world (Romans 12:2). When H. novus offers his/her entire self to God, a change
will happen in their relation to the world. They are called to a different
lifestyle than what the world offers with its behavior and customs, which are
usually selfish and often corrupting (Galatians 1:4; 1 Peter 1:14). They are to
live as citizens of a future world. There will be pressure to conform, to continue
living according to the script written by the world, but they are forbidden to
give in to that pressure. But refusing to conform to this world’s values must
go even deeper than the level of behavior and customs—it must go to the
transforming of the way they think. They are to experience a complete
transformation from the inside out. And the change must begin in the mind,
where all thoughts and actions begin. Much of the work would be done by
God’s Spirit in them. As we memorize and meditate upon God’s word, our
way of thinking changes. Our minds become first informed, and then
conformed to the pattern of God, the pattern for which we were originally
designed. When H. novus has had his mind transformed and is becoming more
like God, he will know what God wants and he will want to do it for it is good,
pleasing to God, and perfect for him. The greatest of all miracles is the
transformation of one’s conduct and the renewing of one’s “mind.” Such an
inward spiritual transformation as makes the whole life new—new in its
motives and ends, even where the actions differ in nothing from those of the
world—new, considered as a whole and in such a sense as to be wholly
unattainable except through the constraining power of the love of God. And
the third, Homo novus
studies and applies God’s The Old and New Man of St. Paul
word so that it changes his St. Paul exhorts us “to put off the old man, which is
behavior from within (2 corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; and to be
Timothy 3:15-16). Scripture renewed in the spirit of our mind; and to put on the
is inspired and infallible, it new man, which after God is created in
is also useful. The Scripture righteousness and true holiness,” that by here also
is not a collection of stories, making a distinction between the two substances,
fables, myths, or merely and applying the old one to the flesh and the new
human ideas about God. It one to the spirit, he ascribes to the old man—that
is to say, the flesh—a permanent corruption. Let
is not a human book.
all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamor,
Through the Holy Spirit,
and evil-speaking, be put away from you, with all
God revealed his person
malice: but be you kind one to another, tenderand plan to certain hearted, forgiving one another, even as God in
believers, who wrote down Christ hath forgiven you.”
his message for his people.
This process is known as “inspiration.” The writers wrote from their own
personal, historical, and cultural contexts. Although they used their own
135
minds, talents, language, and style, they wrote what God wanted them to
write. Scripture is completely trustworthy because God was in control of its
writing. Its words are entirely authoritative for our faith and lives. Scripture
can teach us what is true. The content and teaching of truth which must flow
from the Scripture and it should be consistent with Scripture, identifying its
divine source; by making it the source of doctrine.
(B). Another important requirement is that Homo novus must display a new
nature, an optimistic view of life: Homo novus is the conqueror of evil and disbelief:
he is no more the son of darkness, on the other hand he is the son of light. It is due
to the maturity of time and the long process of metamorphism. Homo novus is
like a kind of butterfly just emerged out of the cocoon of time. Religions wanted
to see this butterfly already at the beginning of our human evolution, but
frustratingly met with disappointment, without understanding that time is the
key! Remember the Good Book saying,“that there is time for everything: a time to
laugh, a time to mourn, a time to plant, a time to reap…” Here we are! It is time for
Homo novus! At last all religions can relax and take pride in contributing to this
unfolding! However, while we are still on this earth we will struggle a bit with
our old way of life. At the same time, something alluring is beckoning man at
a distance, pressuring him in the necessity of becoming a stronger and more
perfect in the status of new creature. This new person is created according to
the likeness of God—new, righteous, holy, and true. Homo novus has a right
relationship with God that results in right behavior, has a positive outlook on
life and creates an aversion to sin, and prompts him to devote himself in the
creation of new earth. These qualities are “true,” meaning they cannot be
faked. This is totally opposite of the old way of living characterized by sin
and corruption. Finally, Homo novus refers not to a split in one’s personality;
instead, it pictures the new direction, attitude, and mind-set away from self
and toward God and his will. The world and the time of Homo novus could be
called “the Golden Age of Humanity.” It would be the time of optimism, which
is associated today with a happier and longer life in contrast with the
pessimistic life which results in negative thinking, and the latest findings
confirm that a pessimistic outlook not only kindles anxiety, which can put
people at risk for chronic mental illnesses like depression, but may also
cause early death and set people up for a number of physical ailments,
ranging from the common cold to the heart disease and immune disorders.
Is it possible to master the principles of optimism the same way we might
learn a new hobby or follow a recipe? The answer from the experts seems to
be yes! But it does take effort. Seeing the sunny side doesn’t come easily.
Most people would define optimism as being eternally hopeful, endlessly
136
happy, with a glass that’s perpetually half full. But that’s exactly the kind of
deluded cheerfulness that positive psychologists wouldn’t recommend.
Healthy optimism is what is needed and it means being in touch with reality. It
certainly doesn’t mean being Pollyannaish18 and thinking everything is great
and wonderful.
Studies suggest that, people who are able to focus on the positive fallout
from a negative event, basically cope with failure can protect themselves
from the physical toll of stress and anxiety. Being optimistic doesn’t mean
shutting out sad or painful emotions, but to face and crush them before they
could get you. Science suggests that the greater part of an optimistic outlook
can be acquired with the right instruction. It’s an active process, through which
you force yourself to see your life a certain way. Indeed, the leading optimism
and happiness experts consider themselves born pessimists. But if they have
learned over time and with lots of practice to become more hopeful, take
heart, so can you! An optimistic man is an eternally positive being, inevitably
destined to become a Homo novus, has an eternal, permanent and everlasting
marker and there is no turning back. This is the time of equality among nations
and peoples. There will be no problems like race, language, color, nationality,
no differences of any kind, the old order has passed away, the new Earth has
come, with it the new man is born. St. Paul puts it so beautifully “There is no
Greek or Roman, slave or free…” There will be one Father and we are all his
children. In Christianity this is possible through the New Life we received
through Baptism.19 Transformation begins in the mind and results in renewed
behavior. I won’t be fully wrong if I could say that Homo novus would be a
believer in one God, the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth. This
is the time of real prosperity of peace, love, happiness and fullness and this
is the time of the birth of a New Earth. When a number of spiritualized
evolutionary individuals appear, they can come together and form a collective
existence: that is the beginning of what the book of Revelation calls “a New
Heaven and a New Earth” (Rev 21:1). There is a new world emerging from
the old world. There is a new consciousness being born on Earth that has
never existed before.
Homo novus, New Creation, New Birth, and New Life: can be better
described again in the Holy Week, on the night of Easter Vigil. The second
symbol, besides ‘light’, of the Easter Vigil: the night of Baptism – is water. It
appears in sacred Scripture, and hence also in the inner structure of the
18
Pollyanna is an eternal optimist or an unrealistically optimistic person.
In Greek ‘baptein’ means ‘to dip’, in Christian churches, the universal rite of initiation,
performed with water, usually in the name of the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
19
137
sacrament of Baptism with two opposed meanings. On the other hand there
is the sea, which appears as a force antagonistic to life on earth, continually
threatening it; yet God has placed a limit upon it. Hence the book of
Revelation says that in God’s new world, the sea will be no more (21:1). It is
the element of death and also of life. And so it becomes the symbolic
representation of Jesus’ death on the cross: Christ descended into the sea,
into the waters of death, as Israel did into the Red Sea. Having risen from
death, he gives us New Life. This means that Baptism is not only a cleansing, but
a New Birth: with Christ we, as it were, descend into the sea of death, so as to rise
up again as New Creatures. The other way in which we encounter water is in
the form of the fresh spring that gives life, or the great river from which life
comes forth. According to the earliest practice of the Church, Baptism had
to be administered with water from a fresh spring. Without water there is no
life. It is striking how much importance is attached to wells in sacred Scripture.
They are places from which life rises forth. Beside Jacob’s well, Christ spoke
to the Samaritan woman of the new well, the water of true life. He reveals
himself to her as the new definitive Jacob, who opens up for humanity the
well that is awaited: the inexhaustible source of life-giving water (John 4:5-15).
St. John tells us that a soldier with a lance struck the side of Jesus, and
from his open side; from his pierced heart, there came out blood and water
(John 19:34). The early Church saw in this a symbol of Baptism and Eucharist
flowing from the pierced heart of Jesus. In his death, Jesus himself became the
spring. The prophet Ezekiel saw a vision of the new Temple from which a
spring issues forth that becomes the life-giving water. From him, the great
river pours forth, which in Baptism renews the world and makes it fruitful; the
great river of living water, his Gospel which makes the earth fertile. In a
discourse during the Feast of Tabernacles, though, Jesus prophesized
something still greater: whoever believes in me … ‘out of his heart shall flow
rivers of living water’ (John 7:38). In Baptism, the Lord makes us not only
persons of light, but also sources from which living water bursts forth. We all
know people like that, who leave us somehow refreshed and renewed;
people who are like a fountain of fresh spring water. We do not necessarily
have to think of great saints like Augustine, Francis of Assisi, Theresa of Avila,
Mother Theresa of Calcutta and so on, people through whom rivers of living
water truly entered into human history. Thanks be to God, we find them
constantly even in our daily lives: people who are like a spring. Let us ask the
Lord, who has given us the New Life, for the gift always to be sources of pure,
fresh water, bubbling up from the fountain of his truth and his love.
138
Homo novus to Homo angelicus:
The Ethereal – 850,000 AD to 1 Million AD
The sacred text from Psalms reads: “You have made man little less than the
angels, and crowned him with glory and honor” (Psalm. 8:3-5). In Persia, God
emanated archangels who carried even in their names qualities of God. So
in Zoroastrianism one finds archangels with names such as “Immortality,”
“Love,” and “Perfection.” This way of naming archangels and angels found
its way into Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The archangels Babriel, Uriel, and
Raphael, for example, carry in their names the qualities of the strength of
God, the light of god, and the exhaling power of God.
Angels (their name means “messengers”) are one of the two sorts of
personal beings that God created, humankind being the other. There are
many of them (Matt. 26:53; Rev. 5:11). They are intelligent moral agents, not
embodied or ordinarily visible, although they are able to show themselves
to humans in what appears as a physical form (Gen. 18:2–19:22; John 20:1014; Acts 12:7-10). They do not marry, and they are not subject to death (Matt.
22:30; Luke 20:35-36). They can move from one point in space to another,
and many of them can congregate in a tiny area (Luke 8:30, where the
reference is to fallen angels). Like human beings, the angels were originally
set under probation, and some of them fell into sin. The many angels who
passed the test are now evidently confirmed in a state of holiness and
immortal glory. Heaven is their headquarters (Matt. 18:10; 22:30; Rev. 5:11),
where they constantly worship God (Ps. 103:20-21; 148:2) and whence they
move out to render service to cosmos at God’s bidding (Heb. 1:14). These
are the “holy” and “elect” angels (Matt. 25:31; Mark 8:38; Luke 9:26; Acts
10:22; 1 Tim. 5:21; Rev. 14:10), to whom God’s work of grace through Christ is
currently demonstrating more of the divine wisdom and glory than they
knew before (Eph. 3:10; 1 Pet. 1:12). Holy angels guard believers (Ps. 34:7;
91:11), little ones in particular (Matt. 18:10), and constantly observe what
goes on in the world (1 Cor. 11:10). It is implied that they are more
knowledgeable about divine things than humans are (Mark 13:32), and that
they have a special ministry to believers at the time of their death (Luke
16:22), but we know no details about any of this. Suffice it to pinpoint the
relevance of angels by saying that if at any time we stand in need of their
ministry, we shall receive it; and that as the world watches people in hope of
seeing them tumble, so do good angels watch people in hope of seeing
grace triumph in their lives.
Homo angelicus would be capable of becoming closer to an angel in
future human evolution. Therefore it is important to define and enumerate
139
all the characteristics of an angel. The Angel, no stranger to the earliest records
of mankind, remains nevertheless a good test of faith. In philosophy, our
greatest thinkers, and in literature our greatest poets have acknowledged
the spiritual world. That an intense look at the heavens cannot bring a single
angel into view does not mean that the angels are not there. Nor again, that
they are. It proves neither. It leaves the question open to other avenues of
information than the senses. Angels owe their credibility, for those who believe in
them, to divine revelation. If all its angels were deleted from scriptures, the
reader would see from the void, how necessary they are to the sacred text.
They belong there. They play too impressive a part in the divine story exert
too strong an influence at its more critical moments to be passed off as only
incidental to it. They come into the recorded scenes as visitors who are not
strangers. Their appearances, far from ever disrupting the narrative, fit into it
and heighten its meaning. An exact count of the angels in monotheistic
religions would alone suffice to establish their importance to divine
revelation. Every department of art has done the angels proud. Oratorios
sing of them. Epics acclaim them. Sculpture has molded, painting has worked
into human shape of transcendent charm their ethereality. We take their
portrayals for granted, so used to them have we become, wherever we find
them. Angels have become as established familiarity to our culture. Even
now, when that culture is in decline, they remain an interest. We are thereby
the richer. And a study of them, who they are, what their nature is, their role
in eternity, their place in the universe, their influence on history, their
prevalence in art: all this, as gathered from holy books and theology and the
accounts of authentic visionaries, should not be held in contempt. The angels
mean so very much to the human race. They deserve attention.
Angels and Demons - Angelology
I believe that nothing unreal exists. So many people have believed in Angels and
Demons and continue to believe in them, despite this graceless age in which we
live, that they must be real. In one form or another, the belief in angels appears in
the earliest stages of Jewish history, and continues to live in the spiritual world of
the Jews and those professing the religions that sprang from Judaism; namely,
Christianity and Mohammedanism. It can not be denied that the belief in such
beings was also held by other peoples and other religions; but here the concern is
only with Jewish Angelology, which can hardly be said to have ever been reduced
to a complete system, such as is maintained by the Catholic Church. It is funny that
we believe in the science fiction aliens we read about and view, but so many people
are unwilling to believe in these older alien visitors and benefactors. We need to
see with better eyes and bow our heads in veneration before something greater
than ourselves. As for the question about Angels being aliens, they most definitely
140
are. They are of a certain type, long lived, possessing powers beyond our
comprehension, and a way of thinking that is not us. Angelology is that branch of
theology which treats of angels. Angels (from angelos = messenger in Greek) are
according to the usual conception superhuman beings dwelling in heaven, who,
on occasion, reveal to man God’s will and execute His commands. Demons are evil
creatures that inspire dread and fear in mortals. In religions worldwide, any of
various evil spirits that mediate between the supernatural and human realms.
Almost all demons are members of the Burning Legion, a group with phenomenal
power that roams the cosmos preying on worlds. The term comes from the Greek
word daimon , a divine or semidivine power that determined a person’s fate.
Zoroastrianism had a hierarchy of demons, which were in constant battle with
Ahura Mazda. In Judaism it was believed that demons inhabited desert wastes,
ruins, and graves and inflicted physical and spiritual disorders on humankind.
Christianity placed Satan or Beelzebub at the head of the ranks of demons, and
Islam designated Iblis or Satan as the leader of a host of evil jinn. Hinduism has
many demons, called asura s, who oppose the devas (gods). In Buddhism demons
are seen as tempters who prevent the achievement of nirvana. It is our hubris as
human beings to think we are so advanced ethically, morally, and technologically.
Compared to cave men, perhaps we are. Compared to Angels, we are not. We have
much to learn and far to go genetically given that we are evolving into something
resembling Angels far in our future.
Angel has been defined as a creature who for sheer excellence comes
nearest to God; a spirit, although he may for his purpose assume a human
form; a person without sex. The angel, it may reasonably be said, is a no-body
of tremendous importance. What does it mean when theology says that the
angel is a pure spirit? It means that he is a being inaccessible to our senses;
his is a nature without physical shape, and when he assumes a form it is not
of his essence; he is a compound of sheer intelligence and will. He is all spirit,
the most excellent of creatures because he bears the strongest resemblance
to God, reflecting best God’s beauty and holiness and majesty. So teaches
St. Thomas Aquinas, a Christian theologian, who once enjoyed the direct
experience of an angelic apparition. Being a pure spirit, the angel is never a
weakling. He takes no half measures. He is forthright. He cannot hesitate.
Everything he does has behind it the full and instant energy of his powerful
will. He gets around with a speed that would embarrass an airliner. He moves
at will. Space throws up no barriers to his flight. Nothing within the wide limits
of his created power can restrict him. A spirit of his purity, reasons the Summa,
“is where he acts and is instantaneously present where he decides to be.” An
angel, exerting his power on our material world, does it by the providence
141
of God. He can do it, now here, now there, anywhere at all. How far apart the
points of action, it does not concern him. Distance to him is no problem.
His intellect, matching his prodigious force of will, understands with
unerring accuracy the universe. Think of the centuries of laborious striving
on the part of astronomy to accumulate its fragmentary information, and
then consider this: the angel knew it all from his beginning, and all that
astronomy has still to learn. He does not by means of a telescope have to
compute the vast reaches of inter-stellar activity. He suffers no pangs of
frustration. He has no regret that, having done his best, trillions of unattainable
stars remain outside his calculations. He already has their number. Created in
full possession of his great natural endowments, the angel has had the mind
to penetrate from the start the toughest secrets of science and to
comprehend with the quickness of a glance the vast extent of the
complicated universe. The angel has a mind second to God’s. Dante opens
Canto XI of his “Purgatorio” on a high note of praise of the angels for being the
nearest of creatures to God, and the dearest, since they are most like him.
The poet was only repeating what St. Thomas Aquinas had said. He was
expressing in his “terza rima” a conviction common to the ages of faith. And
he was thereby nullifying in advance the glib assumption that, prior to
Copernicus, the faithful believed the universe to have been created for
man’s sake alone. That is an inexcusable false assumption. It betrays an
ignorance of the faith on two counts. Monotheistic religious doctrines have
always held that, first of all, creation renders glory to God. It further holds that,
because of his superiority to man in the natural world, the angel enjoys a deeper
appreciation of it and a closer relationship to it. We are secondary to him. On this
account, however, we needn’t feel at all slighted. Our inferiority admits of a
super-naturalizing that brings with it a share with the angels in their beatitude.
A minority opinion holds that the angels were created with the universe.
Angels belong to the firmament, a higher immaterial realm of the creation.
St. Epiphanus has no doubt about it. Origin admits some hesitancy. And
leaving aside the text altogether, St. Thomas Aquinas argues from the
standpoint of sheer expediency. He thinks it appropriate and therefore inclines
to the belief that, since the angels were to be providentially involved with
the universe, the two got their start at the same time. Not at all argues back
the other side.“Even though the angels had a beginning,” St. Ambrose states
the argument, “they were already there when the universe was created.”
The majority of theologians agree. They consider the opening chapter of
Genesis an exclusive account of the material world, the cosmos, and restrict
the word “heavens” to meaning the visible firmament alone. The term does
142
not, they say, include the spirit world. Rather, they maintain from another text,
that the angels must have antedated the universe, since they are reported
there to have greeted the creation of the stars with a shout of joy. It is not a
conclusive argument. The angels, with their quick, intuitive understanding,
could have come into being with the firmament and have known at once
and jubilantly admired every star in it. They could have arrived in creation
praising it. The universe and the angels took off together, with the latter in full
acclaim of its wonders. Their sense of appreciation does not require time in
which to develop. It is instantaneous. Whether or not the angels preceded
the material world into existence, they did precede man. Satan had already
fallen, a fact which presupposes a heaven of angels from which he defected,
when the story of man opens. The story takes for granted the priority of the
angels.
And from the moment they began to be, they were as many in number
as they are now. They do not generate. They enjoyed a fullness of their
nature instantly, which none of them had yet degraded. They did not have
to develop, as an infant does. Having no bodies, being pure spirits, they had
nothing that could grow. Whatever made up their natural angelhood was all
there, complete, from the start. What they knew, they knew at once. Without
forethought they recognized in their very act of becoming, of being, the
necessity of a creator whom it was as natural for them to acknowledge as it
is for man to breathe. Their own derivative beauty, while enthralling them,
suggested to them without hesitation the superiority of its infinite source.
There were no atheists among the angels. Angels act as well as think, without
hesitancy, without error of judgment, doing what they willed to do within
the spacious confines of a perfect nature. They did not need to think out the
answers. They had them. But their creator, having given them so much, would
on condition give them more. He would offer them the grace that, should
they decide to accept it, would lift them beyond the proudest reach of their
superb nature into the supernatural realm of beatific vision. Meaning exactly
what? That their infinite minds would behold the infinite, see God direct, experience
his unveiled loveliness, which by nature they could not do; and that, having once
glimpsed it, they would be ever drawn to it in an ecstasy of desire for nothing else.
The discovery would be for them an absolute love at first sight, a sudden
intimacy never to diminish, a state of unending bliss that would remain
insatiable while it fulfilled. The beatific vision, open to their choice, could
have been just as surely the reward of the evil spirits as of the good spirits.
Sadly, it is not. They decided against it. They turned it down.
143
The angels are spirits. They had no parents. They required no secondary
agents to get them into existence. They burst into life straight from God as
the immediate offspring of his creative love. Why shouldn’t they, then, in so
appropriate a figure of speech, be called his sons? But a question remains.
Why, if the angels had such a natural proximity to him, such a quick grasp of
his adorability, did a large number of them turn away from God? One look at
the infinite beauty and resistance must become an utter impossibility. But
that was their trouble: Satan and his self-sustained followers decided not to
take the look that would have given them, besides their great exterior
knowledge of God, an intimate experience of his unveiled grandeur.
Fascinated by their own excellence, which admittedly ranks topmost in the
natural order, they set their will against his: they refused his invitation. They
resisted his desire for them to enlarge their capacity for joy to a superangelic fulfillment. Unable to anticipate what this would be like, having to
approach it solely on faith, on the strength of a promise, they preferred their
natural independence. They felt sufficient to themselves. They trapped
themselves in their overweening self-conceit. Here, we find this risk also in
human evolution, possible denial to pursue the path toward angels, choosing
to destroy the very process of becoming angels by human activity against
nature and environment, thus decimate all the life forms to an absolute
extinction, blocking the further development in the natural process.
The argument, neatly developed by St. Thomas Aquinas, does not stop
there. It takes on a deeper dimension. It adds, from the suggestions of patristic
theology, another possible element in the motivation of the defecting angels.
They had been given to understand, so the supposition goes, that lesser
embodied spirits, to be known as men, would likewise be invited to the
same supernatural destiny; and that, moreover, the son of God himself would
become incarnate of a human mother; which in turn would mean that the
angels of the beatific vision would have to adore to the full capacity of their
love a member of the human race who was also a member of the holy trinity.
The unwilling among the angels had had more than their pride would take.
The whole idea of offended their false sense of superiority. They would not yield
their self-sufficiency to a higher state of intercommunicative charity. They
wanted no part of such an affiliation with the Most High; to be shared with
glorified animals, one of whom they would even be expected to adore. It is
their attitude that creates the torment. It revolted them to a consuming
hatred. They would go to hell first! And they did. They must endure in their
loss of God an eternity of frustration. Their misery, accordingly, is entirely of
their own doing.
144
The fallen angels hate humans with an insatiable fury we cannot match,
for in their downfall they retained the vehement intensity of a superior nature.
That such enemies of man exist, faith in divine revelation may not deny. Turn
where you will in the scriptures, turn to the first pages, and the animosity of
hell already shows there in the action of its arch-representative. What is the
story of Eve if not, along with its creational account, an implicit warning?
Whether you interpret the story literally, as it used to be interpreted, or
symbolically, as it is more likely now to be interpreted: its meaning comes
out the same. Satan would like to destroy humanity. We have not yet seen the
end of the worst perpetration of atrocities ever known to the world; the
slaughtered victims have numbered beyond the reach of an accurate count
into the untold millions; the enslavement of large areas of people remains an
accepted status quo because no responsible government dares to challenge
the injustice out of fear of igniting a global holocaust. Satan’s orchestrated
and human induced Global Warming and Climate Change threatens the very
existence of human species. The subtlety of Satan, the shrewd power of his
malice, his pious pretenses, and the way he goes about perverting the faithful
through human agents who may not themselves realize that they are his
stooges. Who knows how much of the strife within nations, or between nations,
between religions, and between races, is attributable to what St. Paul would
call the “Wiles of the Devil?”
Call this craftiest of all deceivers: Satan, the devil, the serpent, Beelzebub
or Lucifer, he remains by any name the implacable foe who, would stop at
nothing to pervert the human race. He and his legions of evil spirits simply
do not like our kind, bearing us a grudge, meaning by every stratagem in
their power to dupe us out of the prospective beatitude they could have
had and rejected. Feeling the misery of their loss even while they will it, they
are not good losers. They want no lesser creatures to fill their vacancies in heaven.
They are furious haters. Satan and his evil spirits can and sometimes do
assume physical form to further their sinister designs. They are reported to
have done so, in scriptures, and in hagiography. They can inflict bodily as
well as spiritual harm: in Bible St. Luke cites an instance in which Satan had
crippled a woman for eighteen years; Jesus cured the woman in a moment.
Our haters from hell have also entered human bodies to torment them, to
use them vilely. The evil spirits, banished from heaven, have not been
confined to hell in the sense that they cannot by dint of their great natural
agility intrude upon our world. For this reason some theologians prefer to call
hell a state of being rather than a locale. Diabolical influence will not be totally
crushed until doomsday, when the whole human race from Adam to the
final generation will stand divided between the blessed, forever secure
from hell, and the damned, forever its captives. The conflict will then have
145
reached a permanent conclusion. The fallen angels, who would hate us into
hell if given the opportunity, cannot tolerate the faith which would guide us
to heaven. It infuriates them.
The primary function of angels would be, to honor their gracious God,
adore him, express to him their love, to obey his sovereign will, adore his
infinite holiness, ever rejoice to a point of ecstasy in his presence, are all one
with the angels. Another thing the angels do, while forever praising God, is
reflect his glory. Created more closely in his image, they do it better than
man does. To reflect the glory of God while praising and obeying and loving
him remains to the angels their common activity. However, since scriptures
divide the angels into nine ranks, an attempt has been made to assign to
each of the nine a special function within the general scheme. The standard
book of reference on the subject carries the title “De Coelesti Hierarchia.”
Originally ascribed to Dionysius the Areopagite, it has since been credited
to an anonymous writer of the early sixth century. Whoever he may be, the
author arranges his classification into three hierarchies in their order of
importance:
Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones
Dominations, Virtues, Powers
Principalities, Archangels, Angels
Cherubim and Seraphim
Cherubim and seraphim are winged creatures that
appear in Scripture and make their most memorable
appearances in the visions of Ezekiel (1:4-28, 10:3-22),
Isaiah (6:2-6), and John (Rev 4:7). Although not
specifically called angels, cherubim and seraphim are
revealed as living creatures or heavenly beings whose
primary purpose is to worship God at His throne.
Cherubim (also called cherubs) are revealed as
powerful guards or attendants to the divine throne. God
placed cherubims and a flaming sword at the garden
of Eden to guard the way of the tree of life (Genesis
3:24). In the tabernacle and also the temple, gold
cherubim on the mercy seat signified the presence of
God (Exodus 37:7-9; Numbers 7:89; Psalm 80:1). In
Ezekiel’s vision, he saw cherubim as living creatures
next to the throne of God, worshipping and serving Him.
The cherubim had four faces: man, lion, ox and eagle,
although Ezekiel 10:14 replaces the face of the ox with
the face of a cherub. Each living creature possessed
146
The seraphim (to be
on fire, to be ardent) are
accorded the highest
rank, because they
unceasingly chant their
praises to the Most Holy.
However, all nine choirs,
each according to its
capacity, serve a single
unity of purpose. Every
angel of the lowest
order has a voice in the
action, and were his
voice lacking, the loss
would by just so much
weaken the total
harmony.
Angels’ involvement
in the universe takes on
another activity. It includes their custody of mankind. The angels, without
interrupting their adoration, attend to God’s interests on Earth. “I am Raphael,
one of the seven holy angels who present the prayers of the saints,” the
angel at his side told Tobias (story from Bible), finally disclosing his identity,
and implying that, while he had been walking the earth an apparent youth,
he was no absentee from heaven (Tob. 12:15). By his own admission, he
enjoyed with six others a special place of honor there. Whenever is sacred
eloquence there occurs the expression angel of the incarnation, it refers to
Gabriel. In use from the earliest days of the church, it remains a favorite
epithet. It deserves to be. The angel has earned it. He, it was who predicted
to Daniel the time of the messiah’s birth. He announced to Zechariah in the
sanctuary the birth of the precursor, John the Baptist. He brought to Mary
direct from heaven the invitation to become the mother of God, an honor
that would raise her to a dignity above that of the angels themselves. The
whole company of angels without exception finds it an essential of their
beatitude to help those whom the God of their love wants them to help.
Nobody’s guardian angel ever falls asleep. Heaven remains awake, heedful of
our sincere pleas. The seven angels would seem, from a composite of
scriptural texts, to have been so closely taken into God’s confidence that our
petitions to God are their immediate concern. Holy books have told us
enough of the angels, and how they minister to our world, to inculcate a
profound respect for them. Three angels stand out by name, Raphael, Michael
and Gabriel. Gabriel is by the very definition of his name, the angel of
strength. The Christian liturgy so refers to him. It is his sobriquet in an ancient
liturgical chant still in use. “Christ, the glory of the holy angels.” The hymn,
invoking by name the aid of Gabriel and Michael and Raphael, leaves out
none of the unnamed others. It calls upon them all.
If action speaks louder than words; if what a person does reveals his true
evaluation better than what is merely said of him; then Michael may well
hold, as his champions say he does, first place among the angels. He it was
who showed the boldest reaction to the threat upon the majesty of God and
of all the heavenly hosts, rushed to the forefront in the fight against Satan. He
led and he confronted Satan directly. Does he not therefore deserve a
commensurate reward? Did he not thereby gain the primacy among angels?
Scripture includes all the holy angels, leaving out none, when it names him
their leader against the forces of Satan. The text from Revelation reads, “Now
war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon: and
the dragon and his angels fought, but they were defeated. There, as surely as
Satan has been designated the arch-devil, Michael is taken for granted as
the foremost angel of heaven. Therefore Michael is without reservation, the
147
prince of the heavenly hosts. Neither Raphael nor Gabriel is anywhere in the
holy books so called. A unique title, signifying his preeminence, it is in that
sense reserved to Michael. Michael has been classified a seraph, an archangel
(in the hierarchical sense) and even a member of the lowest order, though its
principal one. Tradition, with certain correlative passages from the Bible to
rely on, associates Michael with Gabriel and Raphael as of the privileged
seven who wait upon the throne of God and carry his more important
messages to mankind. Who, incidentally, might the remaining four be? They
go unnamed in the Canonical Books.
But writers of the apocrypha, whose effort is frowned upon, have supplied
the additional names of the septet: Uriel, Raguel, Sariel, Jeremiel. Of all the
angels, Michael was the prime favorite of Israel. The chosen people
acknowledged him as their patron, their protector, their guardian. Great
monotheistic religions equally claim, Michael for its special champion against
evil. Leaf through the standard hymnals still widely in use, and it will be seen
from the lyrics in his honor that his guardianship is taken for granted. The
belief in guardian angels is still very strong among the modern generations.
After all the truth is that every one of us endowed with the potentiality of becoming
an angel. It is all about this book. Every human soul is committed to an angel.
What matters is that we each have an angel, whenever it was he came into
our life who, loves to be with us and even in our disgusting lapses from
grace does not lose interest. More than we realize, it is our angel who prompts
in us those surprising impulses of good, flashes of enlightenment, surges of
confidence, which we credit to our initiative. An angel’s influence nonetheless
leaves the will free to resist. It does not coerce. It only aids. We must rely on
their available help. As the administrators of God’s providence in the world,
the angels respect the freedom which God has imparted to the human will.
Not until the fourth century, when Emperor Constantine began erecting
shrines, did the angels of Christian art take on wings. Thus, in the British
Museum, one may see a bas-relief of St. Michael from the fourth century: the
figure, neatly carved of ivory, has an exquisite pair of wings. And on the
triumphal arch of St. Mary Major’s in Rome the angel Gabriel has been painted
in flight, soaring on the swiftest of wings toward Mary who, amid a cluster of
attendant angels, is seated. The picture, dating from the fifth century, adds to
the evidence that the angel of the Annunciation was a prime favorite of
early Christian art. In art, from birth to death, and after his death, Christ has
had the attention of angels. The medieval cathedrals would naturally attract
anyone who is looking for superb sculpture, the purest of stained glass, and
a worthy percentage of the world’s best painting. Countless number of artists
148
like Fra Angelico, Michael Angelo, Andrea di Verrocchio, Leonardo da Vinci,
Giorgio Vasari, Titian, Andrea del Sarto, Jan Van Eyck, Duerer, Rembrandt,
Murillo, Rubens, Domenico Tiepolo, Jan Gossaert, Giovanni Castiglione, Guido
Reni, John Singleton Copley, Signorelli, have all been acclaimed for their
treatment of angels. No two beauties in the descending choir of angels are
alike. Each one of them wears a distinctive garb, his own pair of wings, and
what he does with his hands, whether he folds them the way he does, or
whether he spreads them out in an expansive gesture of good will toward
men, is a study of the most graceful variety in harmony. Art does not distort,
but interprets. Truly, nowhere so well, as in the great cathedrals do the arts
combine in a common cause to achieve their highest grandeur. It is the
proper home, far more so than the museum for art’s finest collection of angels.
They are present there, in paintings, in mosaics, in wood carvings, in stained
glass; they have been shaped from stone to attitudes of adoration to grace
the sanctuary; and the music of the place becomes itself the jubilee of
angels, adopting their very words, when a full chorus of voices joins the
mighty organ to fill the vast edifice with the praises of God and the edifice
itself? What is such architecture, built so magnificently around the real
presence, but a permanent echo of the angelic choirs? It is a serenade in
stone to the almighty. “Frozen music” the poet Goethe calls it. And so it is: a
cantata, a symphony that never stops its “Gloria in Excelsis Deo.”
The differences between us and our spiritual relatives, balanced against
the similarities, afford a worthier study. Angelology ought to rank higher as a
study than either anthropology or zoology; it deals with higher beings. And
the fact of its being dismissed as of no account or so much guesswork may
be laid to a prejudice. “We have more real knowledge about the angels than
about the brutes,” Cardinal Newman insists in one of his more famous sermons.
The invisible world, do we actually know, runs his argument, whether these
animals think or not? What their destiny is? But scripture has not left us in the
dark about the angels. We must not think we have the world to ourselves.
The angels, though belonging to the invisible world of the spirit, operate in
ours. Resembling the best, yet comparable to the angel, we are an intermediate
between them. Against the Manichean horror of flesh, the Fourth Lateran
Council declared the human body respectable. Man, who hungers for the
stars, need not feel ashamed of his appetite for bread. But it is this duality
about him that intrigues. We can growl like a dog. Yet, like a seraph, we pray.
What distinguishes us from the animal relates us to the angel. It makes him our
cousin. We have the brains to think as really, if not so powerfully, as he does. We
have his ability, though to a lesser degree, to love. Our future lies with him: his
world is our destiny. The above mentioned attributes to angels, can also be found
149
in humans. The affinity could by any number of such parallels be demonstrated.
But nothing more convincingly proves it than our understanding with him
the meaning of words. The fox would make nothing of our lessons in grammar.
None of the angels would need them. In their reported apparitions they
proved themselves to be the readiest of linguists. They did not grope for
words. No language was foreign to their intelligence. They command a easy
diction. Their vocabulary never failed them.
How did angels convey their messages? Was it by a kind of mental
telepathy? Theology has its own word for it: illumination. Angel by a mere
act of the will, St. Thomas Aquinas explains, open their minds to reveal to one
another whatever ideas they choose to impart. Thus, quick as a lightning
flash, Satan made known to his fellow angels his threat upon the almighty.
They caught his meaning instantly, some of them enticed by it, the majority
not. Stung by its absurdity, Michael sprang into action to lead the faithful
with a war cry that was to become his name; who is like God? The angelic
interchange of ideas, being direct, instantaneous, illuminative, excels the
human. We are compelled to express our minds through an imperfect
medium. Every language has its deficiencies which more or less becloud
the meaning. Besides, the speaker himself may have an insufficient
vocabulary, or the hearer may have for idioms little sensitivity. Any of these
liabilities will detract from a precise communication of thought. Worse yet,
when a liar speaks, his words do not convey his thought. They deceive.
Illumination, on the contrary, never does. Satan, whom Christ has called the
father of lies, seduced the other fallen angels, not because they did not read
his mind correctly but because they did. His lie consisted in denying the
truth of God’s supremacy in favor of his self-acclaimed superiority, which
was totally false. But his evil followers, aware of these thoughts in his perverse
mind, which reflected and outshone the pride in theirs, preferred their own
rebellion to subservience under God. They caught the devil’s meaning all
right: he would be their leader. A similar influence exists among the faithful
angels. A member of a higher choir, having superior intelligence, may
illuminate one of lower rank to a greater knowledge of God. Every angel has
his grade of excellence and within that his individuality. There is a continual
intercommunication among the angels. “They exchange between them
without words their thoughts, their counsels,” writes St. John Damascene.
But it is what the angels have in common, their beatitude that puts to best
use their exchange of thought. All of them, loving God together as the source
of their being, cannot but love themselves and one another in their beatific
vision of him. They see in his infinite beauty their own finite reflection, forever
admiring one another accordingly, expressing their admiration in a joy of
150
spirit which the sublimity of great music gives us some faint idea of. The
angelic choirs, united in God, are a vast admiration society which includes
the blessed from our own world. We are relevant to the angels, and they to
us.
That we attribute to them a voice like ours when in reality they speak to
one another without words is only to make ourselves realize the truth of their
doing it at all. They did, of course, in addressing their visionaries on earth,
adopt a human voice. And it always had the greatest charm. The eulogist
who said of Martin Luther King that he spoke with the tongue of angels was
paying the slain orator a superlative compliment. The saints knew a great deal
about the angels. They were on the best of terms with these spiritual cousins who
were constantly and visibly doing them, favors. St. Stanislaus Kostka, detained
in a hostile residence where he lay dying, received holy viaticum (last rite)
from an angel. Angels intervene in human life because, by God’s will, they
consider our business theirs. They mind it better than we can. And to their
favorites, the saints, they have by their apparitions given evidence of their
concern. By their apparitions they have done more. They have proved that
the human form is not beneath their dignity, and is worthy of paradise. The
angels show off the human body, when they assume one, with a glory not of this
world. We need that surprise! Heavenly glory does happen to be its potential
destiny (Imago Dei). We share with the angels an advantage over the rest of
creation. As much animal as the caged curiosities of the zoo, we are yet their
superiors, or they wouldn’t be there. It is a superiority that transcends the
whole material universe.
Flowers have been created, not to delight themselves, but to delight us;
it is not for them to notice their beauty, feel their charm, or to study botany;
the prerogative is ours. Wheat grows out of a tiny seed, ripens toward its
harvest without knowing of the process; its fertility takes no pride in supplying
our human need for bread; it is we who admire the accomplishment. A cow
by her own inner chemistry no less remarkably transforms clover into milk;
the wonder of which, however, escapes her; she must leave to us the wonder
as well as yield to us the cream. And so it goes, from the least to the greatest
in the whole range of materialities. None of them has the human intelligence,
far less the angelic, to think of their creator. The law of gravity doesn’t know
that it holds the stars to their course, controls the traffic of the spheres, to
advertise his omnipotence. As for those very stars, the magnificence of which
overawes astronomy, they could never for as long as they shine understand
the sentiments they once aroused in a poet many generations ago. Unable
to keep the rapturous truth to himself, he sang out to the God of the universe:
“When I behold your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the
151
stars which you have set in place, what is man that you should be mindful of
him, or the son of man that you should care for him? And the psalmist
concludes: “you have made man little less than the angels, and crowned him
with glory and honor” (Psalm. 8:3-5).
Christ himself has proclaimed the high status possible to us: our association
with the angels. He once did so in answer to “some Sadducess, those who
say that there is no resurrection.” They had asked an insidious question. They
got from him no uncertain statement about the faithful departed: “They cannot
die any more because they are equal to angels.” The woes that flesh is to err
cannot tarnish the glory of such a destiny. We are worms, Dante would remind
us, who have it in our power to become the angelic butterfly. And James H.
Billington, in a scholarly analysis of what ails modern education, because of
its divorcement from spiritual values, concludes with a Dantean statement
of his own: “Man is a fallen angel as well as a naked ape. Related to both, he is,
however, closer to the angel. His future is not with the animal world.” He belongs
by destiny, in the golden words of St. Augustine, to “the holy and august assembly
of angels, the republic of heaven, in which God’s Will is law.” Dostoevsky once
said with utter contempt for those dreamers who seek on earth their paradise:
“All the utopias will come to pass only when we grow wings and people are
converted into angels.” The remark ought to be heeded by an age that
worships its own frenzied contemporaneity to no very evident satisfaction.
It is a gem of wisdom from a man of faith, who believes that Christ’s kingdom
is not of this world and that, only when the wayfarer of earth has joined the
fellowship of angels, shall the worthy exile have come home at last. “May the
choirs of angels welcome you,” the funeral chant addresses the soul of the
deceased, whose mortal remains will on the final day revive to be happily
reunited to the soul, if that soul has attained salvation. It will indeed be the
happiest of reunions. It will be for the glorified body a proud homecoming, with
all the angels in attendance, as the Christ of their adoration himself pronounces
the welcome: “Come, O blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared
for you.” History of life states that all creation moves towards a more complex
and higher order. Hence, Homo diaboli has to retire and Homo angelicus
wins.
Homo angelicus to Homo Imago Dei –
1 Million AD to 2 Million AD
“Wake up man, and recognize the high estate of your human nature.
Remember you are made in God’s image…” Pope St. Leo the Great (461).
The Omega Point - When man learns who he is and what he can be, he
is filled with wonder. The author of Genesis places man at the pinnacle of
152
creation. The chaos and void of the first verse gives way to the power of the
Spirit of God and there is light: heaven and earth divide; land appears with
its animals and vegetation; the waters teem with creatures of the deep and
God sees that it is all good. The animals receive their blessing to multiply and
finally God comes to man: “Let us make man in our image, in the likeness of
ourselves, and let them be masters of the fish of the sea, the birds of heaven, the
cattle, all the wild beasts, and all the reptiles that crawl upon the earth (Gen. 1:2627).” At the height of the pyramid stands man who is not merely given a
blessing but is created according to a special plan: man is the closest to God
of all creation, for he alone is created in the image and likeness of God. Man
enjoys transcendence over the rest of creation somewhat similar to that
which is proper to God himself.
The Hebrew word for image ‘selem’ is a concrete term that implies a
strictly physical resemblance. Likeness ‘demuth’ qualifies and weakens the
force of the first word. Selem alone would suggest the carvings of a statue:
to look at man is to know what God is like. The addition of demuth implies that
we cannot take completely literally the meaning of selem. The image of
God in man is concrete but not photographic. Nor is man’s likeness to God
found in the purely spiritual. For the Israelite, what we call will or intellect or
spirit or soul would be expressed in the word nephesh and includes outward
appearances and inward attitudes, the combination of the visible and the
invisible. For the Israelite, the body is not distinct from the soul or spirit.
There is only the totality that is man with spiritual, physical, material elements,
with attitudes and appearances and actions and needs and wants. There is
no foundation in scripture for what later theology will present as the image
of God found principally in the spiritual qualities of man. The author of Genesis
presents man as one with special dignity and adds that he has received
dominion. Man is first called the image of God: this is softened by the word
“likeness,” and then developed in terms of dominion over creation. Man has
dominion and consequently he is God’s image. Man is the vicegerent of
creation; he is to act on earth as God acted with regard to the universe and
manifest the same qualities on earth that God manifested in creation. Further
help in understanding the meaning of dominion is found in Psalm 8: “What is
man that you should be mindful of him; or the son of man that you should care
for him? You have made him little less than the angels, and crowned him with
glory and honor (5-6).
Man shares in the glory and majesty of God because he alone is created
in his image; he shares in the glory of God when he manifests this glory in his
dominion over the earth. The mercy and fidelity that are the characteristic
153
virtues of God in the exercise of his dominion must also characterize the life
and activities of man. When man exercises his dominion he fulfills his destiny as
one created in the image of God, only if in that exercise of power he shows the
mercy and fidelity of the creator. It is the Psalms that portray the dominion of
God, just as it is the history of Israel that offers concrete signs of his dominion
over Israel: “Give thanks to the Lord of lords, for his mercy endures forever;
who alone does great wonders, for his mercy endures forever… (Psalm.
136:3-9) Just as God concretizes his power over creation in the covenantal
virtues of mercy and fidelity, so man as the pinnacle of that same creation
will be the vicegerent of God, the one who takes God’s place as his image,
when he reflects the same qualities. The theology of Israel’s image of God is
especially remarkable when contrasted with the practices of polytheism of
the same period. The pagans were subservient to creation and placated the
gods of nature. For the author of Genesis, there were no gods of nature.
There is only the God who transcends nature and gives man control and
dominion over creation. Nature is sacred not because it is divine, but because
it has been fashioned by the divine. The author of Genesis also envisaged an
idyllic state of peace as the original order of things. Creation was subservient
to man and man was subservient to God. Man’s dominion was a reflection of
divine dominion, and mercy and fidelity are the sure promise of peace. The
prophets and psalmists lived with the hope that God would one day restore
this harmony, for it was short-lived. The second and third chapters of Genesis
offer a further elaboration of the meaning of creation with the addition of the
power of evil in the world that destroyed the initial peace. Sometime in the
future the original order would be restored such was the constant hope of
Israel.
After the fall, man is deprived of his secure control over creation; he is
deprived of an intimate relationship with his creator, but he is still God’s
image and likeness. Though man does not have the power of creating, he
does have the capacity of procreating living beings in God’s image: “God
created man in his image; in the divine image he created him; male and
female he created them. (Gen. 1:27) Man still has the capacity of reflecting
the qualities of God when he exercises dominion, even if in fact he often
manifests the opposite qualities. In the ninth chapter of Genesis, the author
returns to the theme of the image of God: “If anyone sheds the blood of man
shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has man been made. (Gen.
9:6) Even if a man sins he never loses the stamp of his creator, and never loses his
dignity. Man is sacred and should not be violated. Later in the Old Testament,
the book of Wisdom calls man the image of God: “For God formed man to be
154
imperishable; the image of his own nature he made him (2:23). Wisdom is
bolder than Genesis in affirming that man is the image of God, rather than
created in the image of God. In Wisdom there is also present the theme of
immortality, whereas in Genesis the image of God is seen in his dominion
and sharing in the glory of God. Man, according to Wisdom, is an imperfect
image, but in Wisdom he is also the “spotless mirror of the activity of God
and a likeness to his goodness, mercy and fidelity.” (7:26) Man’s dominion
and his imaging of God are seen as effects of Wisdom: “God of my fathers,
Lord of mercy, you who have made all things by your word. And in your
wisdom have established man to rule the creatures produced by you, to
govern the world in holiness and justice, and to render judgment in integrity
of heart: Give me wisdom, the attendant at your throne, and reject me not
from among your children” (9:1-4). If man receives and accepts the wisdom
of God, then he can fulfill his destiny as the image of God in the exercise of
his dominion. Always it is God who is present to man as he lives as God’s
vicegerent.
The Matrix of Imago Dei
Christ the Image of God - The teaching of Wisdom and Genesis paves the
way for the full revelation made through the perfect image of God: Jesus
Christ. “Christ is the likeness of God” (2 Cor. 4:4); “He is the image of the
invisible God” (Col. 1:15): “He reflects the glory of God” (Heb. 1:3); “We have
seen his glory, glory as of the only son from the father, full of grace and truth”
(John 1:14). In Jesus the mercy and fidelity of God made manifest; he fulfills
the destiny of man to be the glory of God, to perfect the image as stamped in
creation. Jesus reflects the covenantal virtues of God in a human fashion; he
exercises dominion as all men are called to exercise dominion, but always in
a way that reflects the activity of God in his creation. What man was called to
be in creation is realized perfectly in Jesus Christ. Christ is the new man and
through him all believers are new men (Eph. 2:15), able to reflect in their
lives the image that they always maintained. Through the restoration of
dominion and the perfection of the image of God (Rom. 12:2, Eph. 4:23),
man’s understanding is illuminated by the Spirit and now man can judge
according to the ways of God (1 Cor. 2:16). The irrationality of the Genesis
account of man’s desire to be God in judging right and wrong is reversed;
man accepts his relationship to God and overcomes his sinfulness. In union
with Jesus Christ, the new man continually dies to the old man so that, “all of
us, gazing on the Lord’s glory with unveiled faces, are being transformed from
glory into his very image by the Lord who is the Spirit (2 Cor. 3:18). The new man
must make progress in putting on the image of Jesus. The transformation is
155
taking place now with respect to the total man. In Genesis there was no
separation in man between the spiritual and the material; the same is true for
the New Testament. The believer is transformed into the image of Christ with
all of the activities and qualities that are part of a human life.
The Believer and the Image of God - All these elements found in Christ Jesus,
the perfect image of God, attract sinful but hopeful man. The imperfect image
of God that is in man needs desperately the perfect image of God in Jesus Christ
before man can ever hope to rediscover and accomplish his original destiny.
Under the attraction of Jesus, the believer is transformed into the image of
the son of God who is the, first born of many brothers (2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 8:29).
Through baptism20 the believer has put on that new man, constantly being
renewed in the image of his creator where there is no Greek or Jew, male nor
female (Col. 3:10-11; Gal. 3:28). Paul does not look to the past to base his
hope for the transformation of man into the image of God but looks to Jesus
Christ in whom God has revealed the perfect image. When man accepts this
revelation, he may be transformed into a new creation and will be the image of
God, filled with the spirit of God, manifesting the qualities of God. A final element
found in the New Testament, and affecting the understanding of man as
creates in the image of God, is the reality of evil and sin. Paul in particular
recognizes man’s sinful condition, as we have seen. It is evil and sin that mar
the image of God, making us sons of wrath (Eph. 2:3) and lacking in the glory of
God (Rom. 3:23). This does not mean, however, that Paul teaches a doctrine
that presumes the total depravity of man and the loss of the image of God.
Paul wishes only to emphasize man’s need for Jesus Christ as the true image
of God, and so he will propound the lack of glory in man’s life. We have
already seen the various passages in which Paul recognizes the inherent
dignity of man who is called to be the image of God. Because man is created
and destined to be the image of God, he is culpable if he refuses (Rom. 1:2021) and always has the capacity to worship the true God (Acts 17:22-31).
Man never loses his human dignity as created in the image of God even when sin
mars that image, and even when he refuses to reflect that image by his sin.
Conversion, a change of heart, is always possible and once again he will
reflect when he can always reflect: the qualities of God.
History of Man as Imago Dei - The Bible is clear in its teaching on the
meaning of man: man as a totality, male and female with all of the spiritual
and material aspects, is the image of God, destined to be perfected according
20
Baptism in Greek ‘baptein’ means ‘to dip,’ in Christian churches, the universal rite of
initiation, performed with water, usually in the name of the Trinity: Father, Son, and the
Holy Spirit
156
to the perfect image in Jesus Christ. There is no separation of man and no
lessening of the dignity of the sexes. Whatever it is that adequately describes
the mystery of man, it is that mystery that is created in the image of God. In
Christian history, much of this teaching seems to have been lost. The Fathers
of the Church developed the same scriptural theme with much enthusiasm.
The words “image” and “likeness” appeared often in Platonic philosophy,
which saw the visible world as an image of the invisible and only real world.
Greek dualism and the separation of the spiritual and the material formed
the matrix within which the early fathers would present their understanding
of man as created in the image of God. It is no surprise that in their philosophical
world the spiritual would be celebrated and the material would be
downgraded. Something similar would be found in the theology of the
early fathers with regard to man as God’s image. The fundamental question
that occupied the interest of many early theologians was the question of the
primordial image of God after which man was fashioned. What aspect of
God is the exemplar of the image of God in man? Is the fundamental reality
after which man is created the Trinity itself or the Logos, or is the primordial
image the word incarnate, Jesus Christ? The response to this question colored
all subsequent attempts to formulate a theology of man.
Irenaeus of Lyons held closely to the scriptural doctrine and taught that
Christ is the primordial image after which man was created. When Irenaeus
spoke of the word of God, he always meant the incarnate word. Before the
incarnation, the word was present in creation but not visible, and thus man who
was created according to this incarnate word could easily go astray and mar
that image. With the incarnation, what was invisible became visible. The
totality that was Jesus was the manifestation of God’s word as well as the
exemplar of man as created in the image of God. Irenaeus is concrete in his
doctrine of man as well as complete. No aspect of man is lost. Other fathers
of the Church, in particular Clement of Alexandria and Origen, held a different
position in regard to the primordial image of God in man. Both of these
theologians emphasized the Logos as the exemplar for man in creation.
Such an emphasis placed the incarnation in an oblique position and tended
to concentrate on the spiritual aspects of man as manifesting a relationship
to the invisible Logos. The soul, reason, intellect, as well as the exercise of
free will, bound man to the image of God with a corresponding downgrading
of the role of the body of man and its participation in the image of God. In
such a system, it was logical to see a thrust toward asceticism, so that the
more spiritual aspect of man could more readily realize its possibility as
God’s image.
157
The third theologian who influenced the history of the theology of man
as the image of God was Augustine. Unlike Irenaeus, Clement, and Origin,
Augustine developed his theology of man as created in the image of God in
relationship to his doctrine of the Trinity. Neither the incarnate word nor the
Logos is the primordial image. God as Trinity is the exemplar and in particular
the spiritual nature of God as Trinity. Augustine found vestiges of the Trinity
in the mind of man with his division of memory, reasoning, and will. Man
would reflect the Trinity in his mind when he functioned as an intellectual
being. Such teaching influenced all of Augustine’s subsequent theology.
Naturally the emphasis was directed to the spiritual aspect of man to the
detriment of the more biblical understanding that the whole man, body,
spirit, and soul is created in the image of God. Later theologians failed to
follow the lead of Irenaeus and instead developed the insights of Augustine
and Clement and Origen. All of these early fathers concentrated on the
spiritual nature of man so that the scholastic theologians were more
interested in formulating the Christian teaching of man in the image of God
in terms of the soul of Man. The same teaching influenced the catechisms
down to the present time. The concrete vision as seen in the Bible and
preserved briefly by Irenaeus was lost in favor of the spiritual orientation. An
accompanying teaching on asceticism, control of the body and subjugation
of physical drives and desires, has characterized all subsequent theology.
Contemporary Theology of Image of God - Today theologians have returned
to the more biblical approach to man as created image of God. The totality
of a human life in a particular concrete individual, with emotions and intellect
and body and needs and attitudes and desires, is created in the image of
God. There is a dignity and worth present in every individual life that ties
together the spiritual and the bodily. Man is created as open to hear the
word of God in his own life, to speak the word of God, and pronounce this
word to others. The image of God in man implies the possibility that man can
manifest God because in a historical man, Jesus, the word of God became
flesh. We have already seen that Jesus is the only true and complete image
of God. John assures us that;“He who has seen me has seen the Father” (14:9).
Only the word of God can reveal the father because the word of God is the
perfect image of the father in whom the father necessarily and completely
expresses himself. It is the same word, expressing the father perfectly, that
has become incarnate in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ as the image of God in the
world has two implications for man as created in the image of God. First,
human nature is not different to the incarnation; the possibility of man as
created by God implies the possibility of the incarnation, a radical union of
158
God in man. Human nature is so created as to be able to pronounce the word
of God. Secondly, the meaning of a natural image of God in man makes more
sense. Man as person in his unity is created in such a way that he is the
presupposition of the incarnation. Man as a person is the natural image of God.
We say as person because human nature is not the image of God in an
abstract fashion, but is realized only in the concrete man who is personal.
The natural image of God in man is something absolute, inasmuch as man is
the image of God as personal; it is something relative inasmuch as this is
always a possibility that is related to the actual manifestations of God in time.
If God so wishes to express himself through the incarnation of his word, then
man is ready because God has so created him. Historically this possibility
was verified in Jesus Christ. The assumption of a human nature by the word
of God sanctified that humanity so that in him mankind reached the destiny
toward which God had always directed it; a radical union between God and
man was eternally established and verified. Jesus of Nazareth, true man, was
the image of God on earth; he was the incarnation of the word of God and
spoke that word in his life and in his death, in the totality that makes up a
human life and a human death.
Christian anthropology must
look to Christ as the exemplar of
man himself, as one who lived in
love, who responded to the
invitation of the father and
manifested in the totality of his
existence something of the
glory of God in his efforts to
show the kindness, the mercy,
and the fidelity of God to his
most noble creature even in the
midst of the creature’s failure.
For those who are called to
reflect that same image, Jesus
offers not only the fulfillment of
what comes from creation, but
the fulfillment that comes from
being called to be sons in the
son. The destiny of humanity is
to be conformed to the glorious
image of Jesus. Believers look
Christian Anthropology
Anthropology is the study of humanity.
Christian Anthropology is the study of
humanity from a Christian / Biblical
perspective. It is primarily focused on the
nature of humanity—how the immaterial
and material aspects of man relate to each
other. Christian Anthropology deals with
who we are and how we relate to God.
Whether a people are inherently good or
inherently sinful is crucial in determining
how our relationship with God can be
restored. Whether the souls of human
beings carry on after death determines in
large part our view of our purpose in this
world. Christian Anthropology helps us to
understand ourselves, from God’s
perspective. A key verse on Christian
Anthropology is Psalms 139:14, “I praise
you because I am fearfully and wonderfully
made; your works are wonderful, I know
that full well.”
159
forward to a transformation of the lowly state in which they now live to the
state of assimilation to Jesus. Not only is man called to speak the word of
God, he is called to be his son. The transformation is taking place now in the
lives of humans, but is completed in us only when we bear the image of the
heavenly man (1 Cor. 15:49; Eph. 1:18-23), which is yet to come. Our
predestination is to share in the glorious Christ (Rom. 8:29-30) in the totality
of our existence: “The dead will be raised imperishable and we shall be
changed” (1 Cor. 15:52). The destiny of man involves his body as well as his
spirit, and it is this destiny that has begun with the assimilation to Christ, but
will be completed only when man is transfigured to be conformed to the
glorious son of the father. While we maintain our vision on the end of man, we
can never rescind from the process that leads to that end. Redemption and
salvation are not in the future alone; salvation is now. The conquest of evil and
the participation in the goodness of God are not reserved for the eschaton;
they take place where man lives his life in goodness and fidelity to his
calling; they bring peace and satisfaction and contentment to man’s earthly
life or else they have no appeal to a man who lives in a real world.
This life in God that takes place now, however, cannot be considered
apart from the example of the life of Christ himself who became a servant to
all even to the point of death. He humbled himself and became obedient
unto death” (Phil. 2:8), so that he could experience the exaltation to the right
hand of the father and the restoration to his rightful place (Phi. 2:9-11). If this
was the fate of the man who expressed the word of God in full measure, then
believers can expect no less. If we desire to live with Christ, then we must
accept a daily dying. It is Christian belief that in baptism we die with Christ
in order to live with him (Rom. 6), just as we believe that in the Eucharist we
proclaim his death until he comes (1 Cor. 11:26); but the law of assimilation to
Christ is not reserved to the sacramental activity of Christianity alone. In the
daily lives of believers there is a dying as well as a rising. The image of God in
man is not a static, once-for-all image; it is a dynamic as man is dynamic, involving
a daily assimilation to the glorious Christ, and comprehends the totality of
Christian existence. Man is never closed to God; nor is he without his personal
value and dignity. He always has the possibility of responding to a God who
offers himself in love and promises him that his destiny will be realized only
when in his life he offers to his fellow-man the kindness and fidelity that
characterize God. Moreover, the teaching is not a spiritualism since it always
considers man in the concrete and promises a destiny that involves body as
well as spirit, a destiny that is not limited to some future Eon but is possible now,
but only when man is willing to pay the cost and speak the saving word of
160
God to his fellow-man without seeking to serve himself. As the first aspect of
a full Christian anthropology, man as created in the image of his God lays the
foundation for all future development, as well as for an optimism that can never
be erased in spite of any efforts on the part of man to deny who he is by the life he
lives.
No Man is an Island: Pope Benedict XVI –
Caritas in Veritate
While we discuss about the contemporary theology of Imago Dei, it is
very important to know what the supreme Pontiff has to say in his latest
encyclical, “Caritas in Veritate” (Charity in Truth). The four pillars of Catholic
Social Doctrine are: human dignity, subsidiarity, solidarity and the common good.
But coming to grips with this approach repays the effort, for there is something
far greater in “Caritas in Veritate.” The key concept running through the whole
encyclical; used 22 times to amplify the traditional concept of ‘ human
dignity’; is ‘integral human development,’ which emphasizes that the dignity
of each and all necessarily stands firm because of our divine filiation. What
being ‘human’ means has changed. Central to the new understanding is
‘rationality’; the recognition of our inherently human social relationships and
its consequences. That removes an ambiguity attaching to ‘human dignity’,
namely that it could apply to the ‘lone individual’; someone whose social
relationships do not serve to make him or her distinctively human. Instead,
Caritas in Veritate seeks to define the conditions for what it calls the
‘development of the whole man and of all men’ and holds that this must be
based upon ‘a deeper critical evaluation of the category of relation.’ This
focus is on human relations; as the key to global unity; is sanctified by direct
comparison with the Trinity, which is ‘absolute unity insofar as the three
divine persons are pure rationality.’
To emphasize ‘rationality’ means breaking with enlightenment
‘individualism’, still hugely influential in two forms within the social sciences.
On the one hand, homo economicus, dear to neo-liberal economists, is an
under-socialized loner, concerned only with maximizing his/her own
preferences in order to become ‘better off’. ‘Economic man’ is like Clint
Eastwood, riding into town from nowhere, doing what he feels a man’s got to
do, before cantering into the sunset, unaffected by his recent relationships
and indifferent to how he has affected the township. On the other hand,
homo sociologicus (more familiar as ‘Organization man’) is over-socialized;
everything about him is a gift of society. Whether this makes ‘him’ a creature
of social norms or a playful postmodernist, ‘he’ is a creature of his
circumstances, a born relativist, sharing nothing with the universal family of
161
humankind and thus incapable of solidarity with it. Because homo economicus
is anthropocentric and homo sociologicus is socio-centric, there is no place in
either for transcendence. In no respect does homo relatus share any family
resemblance with these two models. The problem with the notion of
rationality is we are so familiar with what it really is that it is taken for granted
rather than taken seriously. Try this thought experiment. You are walking in a
park behind a couple, closely entwined and probably deeply in love. You
feel no attraction towards the particular man or woman, but what you
recognize or even long for is their loving relationship, something generated
between them but irreducible to the two individuals involved. This is what
Caritas in Veritate grasps when it affirms that ‘one of the deepest forms of poverty
a person can experience is isolation.’ It is what St. Augustine meant by ‘our
hearts are restless’ until we realize the relationships that divine revelation
offers us; with father, mother, brother and friends. What Caritas de Veritate
invites us to do is to sanctify every human encounter with ‘fraternity’ and to
extend this to the whole of humanity, making it one global family through
‘relational inclusion’ (unhelpfully translated as ‘inclusion-in-relation”).
However,‘fraternity’; the revolutionary slogan that has dropped off the social
agenda; is promoted by some forms of social organization and deterred by
others.
What is generated by social relationships is precious and any attempt to
divide what they produce destroys the very relationship. Think, for example,
of the orchestra or the football team; no one can take away his or her part or
share without ruining the whole. A divorcing couple cannot go off with their
portion of the marriage; they can only apportion their possessions, including
their children. The marriage itself is dissolved and no longer generates
anything because the relationship no longer exists. In short, the common
good cannot be parceled out among those producing it. So each of what is
termed the ‘relational good’ continues to exist solely because those involved
value its worth and work to sustain the relationships, generating it. Their
actions are orientated towards this common good and their attitudes towards
their co-producers are totally unlike contractual market relations. Generosity
and ‘free giving’ fuel these relationships. It is salutary to see how fast this kind
of relationship can be altered: when blood donors in the United States were
paid, the result was fewer donors and a lower quality of blood. Conversely, to
develop a good new relationship is to acquire a good new source of
motivation; to serve the group in solidarity with it. The attitude in question is
what John Paul II in his 1979 encyclical “Redemptor Hominis” called ‘social
love’, which, if sufficiently expansive contributes to building up the ‘civilization
of love’ towards which Caritas de Veritate’ is directed. This would be a just
162
society in a much wider sense than any other school of thought of social
justice. Just as there are ‘relational goods’ there are ‘relational bads’; evils,
structural sins, undesirables, what are termed disutilities in economics. In this
respect the encyclical gives multinational capitalism and deregulated
finance a rough ride.
Capitalism is only one form of market economy, governed by the pursuit
of profit and the ‘total good’ of its ‘shareholders’ rather than the ‘common
good’ of all its ‘stakeholders’: employees, suppliers and dependants, from
pensioners to the natural environment. Conversely, a ‘civil economy’ would
serve all of the above, without discounting the poorest (which increases the
‘total good’) and handing their welfare over to the state. A further way of
‘civilizing the economy,’ stems from neither ‘private’ nor ‘public’ enterprises
but from voluntary initiatives based on principles of mutuality and serving
social ends. Perhaps the most radical statement in Caritas de Veritate is that
‘the exclusively binary model of market-plus-state is corrosive of society’.
Human beings need more than exchange relations and command relations;
they need the human relations nurtured in civil society. Within civil society,
subsidiarity alone allows the plurality of people’s gift to be expressed and
the diversity of their requirements to be met. Yet, beyond a few illustrations;
the most important being ‘fiscal subsidiarity’, which allows citizens the right
to decide how a portion of their government taxes should be spent; the
encyclical properly insists that it is not the church’s job to serve as a think
tank for concrete social policy. What Pope Benedict has done in this encyclical
is to issue a fundamental challenge to the social sciences; currently
preoccupied with meeting academia’s ‘performance indicators’; to place
the well-being of global humanity at the top of their agenda. Social theorists are
heard, as this encyclical demonstrates; now we have to take up the challenge
by saying more that is worth hearing.
Human Hubristic Blunders – Time of Anarchy
“When goodness grows weak,
When evil increases,
I make myself a body.
In every age I come back
To deliver the holy,
To destroy the sin of the sinner,
To establish righteousness.” Bhagavad Gita
The dangers associated with environmental damage have become better
known over the last few decades. In fact, awareness of the crisis we face has
163
entered into the mainstream of politics. Those who assert that environmental
problems are minor or non-existent have, thankfully, become marginalized.
Both politicians and corporations have been keen to announce their “green”
credentials. Which is ironic, as anarchists would argue that both the state and
capitalism are key causes for the environmental problems we are facing. In
other words, anarchists argue that pollution and the other environmental
problems we face are symptoms. The disease itself is deeply imbedded in
the system we live under and need to be addressed alongside treating the
more obvious results of that deeper cause. Otherwise, to try and eliminate
the symptoms by themselves can be little more than a minor palliative and,
fundamentally, pointless as they will simply keep reappearing until their
root causes are eliminated. To quote from the philosopher Murray Bookchin:
“Any attempt to solve the ecological crisis within a bourgeois framework
must be dismissed as chimerical. Capitalism is inherently anti-ecological.
Competition and accumulation constitute its very law of life, a law
summarized in the phrase, ‘production for the sake of production.’ Anything,
however hallowed or rare, ‘has its price’ and is fair game for the marketplace.
In a society of this kind, nature is necessarily treated as a mere resource to be
plundered and exploited. The destruction of the natural world, far being the
result of mere hubristic blunders, follows inexorably from the very logic of
capitalist production.” As Bookchin summarizes, capitalism “has made social
evolution hopelessly incompatible with ecological evolution.” It lacks a
sustainable relation to nature not due to chance, ignorance or bad intentions
but due to its very hubris, nature and workings.
The root causes for our ecological problems lie in social problems.
American philosopher, Murray Bookchin uses the terms “first nature” and
“second nature” to express this idea. First nature is the environment while
second nature is humanity. The latter can shape and influence the former, for
the worse or for the better. How it does so depends on how it treats itself. A
decent, sane and egalitarian society will treat the environment it inhabits in
a decent, sane and respective way. A society marked by inequality,
hierarchies and exploitation will trend its environment as its members treat
each other. Thus “all our notions of dominating nature stem from the very real
domination of human by human.” The domination of human by human
preceded the notion of dominating nature. Indeed, human domination of
human gave rise to the very idea of dominating nature. This means, obviously,
that “it is not until we eliminate domination in all its forms … that we will really
create a rational, ecological society.” By degrading ourselves, we create the
potential for degrading our environment. This means that anarchists
164
“emphasize that ecological degradation is, in great part, a product of the
degradation of human beings by hunger, material insecurity, class rule,
hierarchical domination, patriarchy, ethnic discrimination, and competition.”
This is unsurprising, for “nature, as every materialist knows, is not something
merely external to humanity. We are a part of nature. Consequently, in
dominating nature we not only dominate an ‘external world’—we also
dominate ourselves.”
We cannot stress how important this analysis is. We cannot ignore “the
deep-seated division in society that came into existence with hierarchies
and classes.” To do so means placing “young people and old, women and
men, poor and rich, exploited and exploiters, people of color and whites all
on a par that stands completely at odds with social reality. Everyone, in turn,
despite the different burdens he or she is obliged to bear, is given the same
responsibility for the ills of our planet. Be they starving Ethiopian children or
corporate barons, all people are held to be equally culpable in producing
present ecological problems.” These become “de-socialized” and so this
perspective “side-step[s] the profoundly social roots of present-day
ecological dislocations” and “deflects innumerable people from engaging
in a practice that could yield effective social change.” It “easily plays into the
hands of a privileged stratum who are only too eager to blame all the human
victims of an exploitative society for the social and ecological ills of our
time.” Thus, for eco-anarchists, hierarchy is the fundamental root cause of our
ecological problems. Hierarchy in religions and politics notes Bookchin includes
economic class “and even gives rise to class society historically,” but it goes
beyond this limited meaning imputed to a largely economic form of
stratification.” It refers to a system of “command and obedience in which elites
enjoy varying degrees of control over their subordinates without necessarily
exploiting them,” anarchism, he stressed, “anchored ecological problems for the
first time in hierarchy, not simply in economic classes.” Needless to say, the forms
of hierarchy have changed and evolved over the years. The anarchist analysis of
hierarchies goes “well beyond economic forms of exploitation into cultural forms
of domination that exist in the family, between generations and sexes, among
ethnic groups, in institutions of political, economic, and social management, and
very significantly, in the way we experience reality as a whole, including nature
and non-human life-forms.”
This means that anarchists recognize that ecological destruction has
existed in most human societies and is not limited just to capitalism. It existed,
to some degree, in all hierarchical pre-capitalist societies and, of course, in
any hierarchical post-capitalist ones as well. However, as most of us live
165
under capitalism today, anarchists concentrate our analysis to that system
and seek to change it. Anarchists stress the need to end capitalism simply
because of its inherently anti-ecological nature. The history of ‘civilization’
has been a steady process of estrangement from nature that has increasingly
developed into outright antagonism.” Our society faces “a breakdown not
only of its values and institutions, but also of its natural environment. This
problem is not unique to our times but previous environmental destruction
“pales before the massive destruction of the environment that has occurred
since the days of the Industrial Revolution, and especially since the end of
the Second World War. The damage inflicted on the environment by
contemporary society encompasses the entire world . . . The exploitation
and pollution of the Earth has damaged not only the integrity of the
atmosphere, climate, water resources, soil, flora and fauna of specific regions,
but also the basic natural cycles on which all living things depend.” An everexpanding capitalism must inevitably come into collision with a finite planet
and its fragile ecology. Firms whose aim is to maximize their profits in order
to grow will happily exploit whoever and whatever they can to do so. As
capitalism is based on exploiting people, can we doubt that it will also exploit
nature? It is unsurprising, therefore, that this system results in the exploitation of
the real sources of wealth, namely nature and people. It is as much about robbing
nature as it is about robbing the worker.
Unihuman – Divergence or Convergence
Biologists say that different populations of a species have to be isolated
from each other in order for those populations to diverge into separate
species. That’s the process that gave rise to 13 different species of “Darwin’s
Finches” in the Galapagos Islands. But what if the human species is so
widespread there’s no longer any opening for divergence? Evolution is still
at work. But instead of diverging, our gene pool has been converging for
tens of thousands of years—and Stuart Pimm, an expert on biodiversity at
Duke University, says that trend may well be accelerating. “The big thing
that people overlook when speculating about human evolution is that the
raw matter for evolution is variation,” he said. “We are going to lose that
variability very quickly, and the reason is not quite a genetic argument, but
it’s close. At the moment we humans speak something on the order of 6,500
languages. If we look at the number of languages we will likely pass on to our
children, that number is 600.” Cultural diversity, as measured by linguistic
diversity, is fading as human society becomes more interconnected globally,
Pimm argued. “I do think that we are going to become much more
homogeneous,” he said. Ken Miller, an evolutionary biologist at Brown
166
University, agreed: “We have become a kind of animal monoculture.” Is that
such a bad thing? A global culture of Unihumans could seem heavenly if we
figure out how to achieve long-term political and economic stability and
curb population growth. That may require the development of a more
“domesticated” society—one in which our rough genetic edges are
smoothed out. But like other monocultures, our species could be more
susceptible to quick-spreading diseases, as last year’s bird flu epidemic.
“The genetic variability that we have protects us against suffering from
massive harm when some bug comes along,” Pimm said. “This idea of
breeding the super-race, like breeding the super-race of corn or rice or
whatever—the long-term consequences of that could be quite scary.”
Developments in the field are coming so quickly that social commentator
Joel Garreau argues that they represent a new form of evolution. This radical
kind of evolution moves much more quickly than biological evolution, which
can take millions of years, or even cultural evolution, which works on a scale
of hundreds or thousands of years. In his latest book, “Radical Evolution,”
Garreau reels off a litany of high-tech enhancements, ranging from steroid
Supermen, to camera-equipped flying drones, to pills that keep soldiers
going without sleep or food for days. “If you look at the superheroes of the
’30s and the ’40s, just about all of the technologies they had exist today,” he
said. Such enhancements are appearing first on the athletic field and the
battlefield, Garreau said, but eventually they’ll make their way to the collegiate
scene, the office scene and even the dating scene. “You’re talking about
three different kinds of humans: the enhanced, the naturals and the rest,” Garreau
said. “The enhanced are defined as those who have the money and
enthusiasm to make themselves live longer, be smarter, look sexier. That’s
what you’re competing against.” In Garreau’s view of the world, the naturals
will be those who eschew enhancements for higher reasons, just as vegetarians
forgo meat and fundamentalists forgo what they see as illicit pleasures. Then
there’s all the rest of us, who don’t get enhanced only because they can’t.
“They loathe and despise the people who do, and they also envy them,”
Garreau said. Scientists acknowledge that some of the medical
enhancements on the horizon could engender a “have vs. have not” attitude.
“But I could be a smart ass and ask how that’s different from what we have
now,” said Brown University’s Ken Miller.
Even a Unihuman culture would have to cope with evolutionary pressures
from the environment, the University of Washington’s Peter Ward said. Some
environmentalists say toxins that work like estrogens are already having an
effect: Such agents, found in pesticides and industrial PCBs, have been linked
to earlier puberty for women, increased incidence of breast cancer and
167
lower sperm counts for men. “One of the great frontiers is going to be trying
to keep humans alive in a much more toxic world,” he observed from his
Seattle office. “The whales of Puget Sound are the most toxic whales on
earth. Puget Sound is just a huge cesspool. Well, imagine if that goes global.”
Global epidemics or dramatic environmental changes represent just two of
the scenarios that could cause a Unihuman society to crack, putting natural
selection—or perhaps not-so-natural selection—back into the evolutionary
game. Then what? Surviving doomsday is a story as old as Noah’s Ark, and as
new as the post-bioapocalypse movie “28 Days Later.” Catastrophes ranging
from super-floods to plagues to nuclear war to asteroid strikes erase
civilization as we know it, leaving remnants of humanity who go their own
evolutionary ways. The classic Darwinian version of the story may well be
H.G. Wells’“The Time Machine,” in which humanity splits off into two species:
the ruthless, underground Morlock and the effete, surface-dwelling Eloi.
At least for modern-day humans, the forces that lead to species spin-offs
have been largely held in abeyance: Populations are increasingly in contact
with each other, leading to greater gene-mixing. Humans are no longer
threatened by predators their own size and medicine cancels out inherited
infirmities ranging from hemophilia to nearsightedness. “We are helping
genes that would have dropped out of the gene pool,” paleontologist Peter
Ward observed. But in Wells’ tale and other science-fiction stories, a civilizationshattering catastrophe serves to divide humanity into separate populations,
vulnerable once again to selection pressures. For example, people who had
more genetic resistance to viral disease would be more likely to pass on that
advantage to their descendants. If different populations develop in isolation
over many thousands of generations, it’s conceivable that separate species
would emerge. For example, that virus-resistant strain of post-humans might
eventually thrive in the wake of a global bioterror crisis, while less hardy
humans would find themselves quarantined in the world’s safe havens.
Patterns in the spread of the virus that causes AIDS may hint at earlier, less
catastrophic episodes of natural selection, said Stuart Pimm: “There are
pockets of people who don’t seem to become HIV-positive, even though
they have a lot of exposure to the virus—and that may be because their
ancestors survived the plague 500 years ago.”
The Noosphere – A Global Positioning System (GPS)
The present epoch is called “Neocene Epoch.” The term Noöcene epoch
refers to “how we manage and adapt to the immense amount of knowledge
we’ve created.” The noosphere is an ethereal communication infrastructure
that empowers the user by harnessing the power of the collective mind.
168
This concept aims to become a think-tank for people who want to implement
the Noosphere, i.e. to reflect creatively about a better future for humanity
by gathering insight into its profound mechanisms. And just when you
thought the universe couldn’t get any bigger, along comes the idea of other
universes and infinite dimensions... The Noophere is a predicted next
evolutionary step in the development of life, a kind of globalized thinking
and consciousness. The noosphere is defined as the sum total of all human
knowledge and experience. This would include everything from our most
private dreams to our knowledge of universe itself, with accelerating
technology as its catalyst. The term Noosphere was coined in 1922 by Pierre
Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955) as part of his philosophy and his intention
to bridge evolutionary science and Christian worldview. Noosphere describes
the evolving sphere of knowledge/cognivity surrounding our planet, a
development he saw as the awakening of global self awareness or the
formation of the global brain, compared to the modern interpretations of
the Gaia theory. Teilhard believed that because of the spherical shape of the
Earth, ideas will eventually encounter other ideas resulting in a cultural
convergence of thought. This, he believed, would eventually lead to a single,
self-developing framework of pure mind. Teilhard used the term “noosphere”
(possibly first coined by Vladimir Vernadsky to represent a sphere of mind
encircling the Earth. As he saw it, the noosphere encased what we call the
biosphere, or sphere of life. Within this framework, Teilhard saw the ongoing
evolution of the human species manifesting itself as changes and advances
in mind more than in body. In other words, human evolution would henceforth
take place mainly in the noosphere.
In the book “The Phenomenon of Man,” Teilhard de Chardin observed
that, from a historical point of view, the “stuff” of this universe is becoming
ever more complex, that information is becoming ever more concentrated.
This book wasn’t published until the late 1950s, after its author, Teilhard had
died. In it, he called this enveloping sphere of thought the noosphere and
described it as “a living tissue of consciousness” enclosing the Earth and
growing ever more dense. For several years after the book’s first English
publication in 1959, Teilhard’s concept of a thinking membrane surrounding
our planet provoked significant controversy in both religious and academic
circles. He further observed that, at least in this corner of the cosmos, human
beings are the most complex of all known forms found in nature. From an
evolutionary standpoint, he also saw that changes taking place in the human
species are occurring in the domain of mind at a much faster rate than
changes seem to appear in our biology. Teilhard was deeply concerned
with establishing a global unification of human awareness as a necessary
169
prerequisite for any real future progress of mankind. Noosphere is the sphere
of human consciousness and mental activity especially in regard to its
influence on the biosphere and in relation to evolution. The noosphere
concept of ‘unification’ was elaborated in popular science fiction by Julian
May in the Galactic Milieu Series. It is also the reason Teilhard is often called
the patron saint of the Internet.
Evolution of Noosphere
One of the original aspects of the noosphere concept deals with evolution.
Henri Bergson, with his L’évolution créatrice (1907), was one of the first to
propose that evolution is ‘creative’ and cannot necessarily be explained
solely by Darwinian natural selection. L’évolution créatrice is upheld,
according to Bergson, by a constant vital force that animates life and
fundamentally connects mind and body, an idea opposing the dualism of
René Descartes. In 1923, C. Lloyd Morgan took this work further, elaborating
on an ‘emergent evolution’ that could explain increasing complexity
(including the evolution of mind). Morgan found that many of the most
interesting changes in living things have been largely discontinuous with
past evolution, and therefore did not necessarily take place through a gradual
process of natural selection. Rather, evolution experiences jumps in
complexity (such as the emergence of a self-reflective universe, or
noosphere). Finally, the complexification of human cultures, particularly
language, facilitated a quickening of evolution in which cultural evolution
occurs more rapidly than biological evolution. Recent understanding of
human ecosystems and of human impact on the biosphere has led to a link
between the notion of sustainability with the “co-evolution” [Norgaard, 1994]
and harmonization of cultural and biological evolution.
The resulting political system has been referred to as a noocracy.
American integral theorist Ken Wilber deals with this third evolution of the
noosphere. In his work, Sex, Ecology, Spirituality (1995), he builds many of
his arguments on the emergence of the noosphere and the continued
emergence of further evolutionary structures. In the 2009 Warhammer 40,000
novel Mechanicum by Graham McNeill, in the book Metro 2033 (book) by
Dmitry Glukhovsky the Noosphere is mentioned as being destroyed during
the last war, and with it also destroying paradise and hell. Along Pierre Teilhard
de Chardin, Julian Huxley and the other neo-Darwinists, the cosmic evolution,
from the big bang up to now, presents nine levels of complexity, which can
be grouped into three stages: the lithosphere (levels 1 to 5, the “dead” matter,
strings, quarks, particles, atoms, molecules, organized by elementary physical
laws), the biosphere (levels 6 to 8, the “living” matter, eobionts, protozoa,
170
metazoan, organized by genetic codes and active by reflexes), and the
noosphere (level 9, the “thinking” matter, human society, organized by the
software of the human brain and active by creative intelligence). Beside this
notion, noosphere, according to the thought of Vladimir Vernadsky, denotes
the “sphere of human thought”. The word is derived from the Greek nous
“mind” +sphaira “sphere” , in lexical analogy to “atmosphere” and “biosphere”.
In the original theory of Vernadsky, the noosphere is the third in a succession
of phases of development of the Earth, after the geosphere (inanimate matter)
and the biosphere (biological life). Just as the emergence of life
fundamentally transformed the geosphere, the emergence of human
cognition fundamentally transforms the biosphere. In contrast to the
conceptions of the Gaia theorists, or the promoters of cyberspace, Vernadsky’s
noosphere emerges at the point where humankind, through the mastery of
nuclear processes, begins to create resources through the transmutation of
elements. It is also currently being researched as part of the Princeton Global.
For Teilhard, the noosphere emerges through and is constituted by the
interaction of human minds. The noosphere has grown in step with the
organization of the human mass in relation to itself as it populates the Earth.
As mankind organizes itself in more complex social networks, the higher the
noosphere will grow in awareness. This is an extension of Teilhard’s Law of
Complexity/Consciousness, the law describing the nature of evolution in
the universe. The expanding omnidimensional structure of all realitylabyrinths on this planet; sum total of all human thoughts, feelings and
(apparent) sense impressions—the noosphere—no longer served as a mere
passive repository of human information (the “seas of knowledge” which
ancient Sumer believed in) but, due to the incredible surge of charge from
our electronic signals and information-rich material therein, we have given it
power to cross a vast threshold; we have, so to speak, resurrected what Philo
and other ancients called the Logos. Information has, then, become alive!
Teilhard argued that the noosphere is growing towards an even greater
integration and unification, culminating in the Omega Point, which he saw as
the goal of history. The goal of history, then, is an apex of thought/
consciousness.
The Omega Point – The End of the Line
“There is a continuum of cosmic consciousness against which our
individuality builds but accidental fences, and into which our several minds
plunge as into a mother sea,” wrote William James in his book “A Pluralistic
Universe.”
171
Recently the lack of finding inner peace, sustainable economics, trust,
social justice and personal and environmental wellness have alarmed me
every minute. I sought and finally found a tool that transformed my depressing
stress and anxiety into responsible stability. I thought I was stressed because
the more I became aware of the destructive things happening to Earth and
to people and places I loved, including myself, the greater became my lack
of hope and feeling either mad, sad or depressed. This divorced me from
both my spirit and partner. I felt anger with God and beauty, a fear and
disrespect of God for letting so much war, suffering and environmental
deterioration occur that I was powerless to change. In time, I became aware
that I was in denial. I denied that I, like many others, had an addiction to
immediate rewards from my dysfunctions. They robbed me of the resilience
to tolerate what I could not change. I’ve been giving a lot of thought to the
probability that our generation, and our next, will be here long after me. I’ve
been trying to envision how the Earth will function in another 20, 30 or 40
years, and whether or not the branches extending from my family tree will
be green and thriving.
To be perfectly honest, I have my moments of doubt. I am tempted at
times to indulge in the cynicism of our age. Yet, just as the doubters and
critics are about take over, I realize that it is up to me to determine how I will
survive amidst the terror of environmental waste, pollution, and destruction.
It is up to me to find strength. It is up to me to find resolve. It is up to me to see
the hidden blessing that my situation is bringing me. In today’s world, millions
of us are feeling the pain of being imprisoned by our current reality upon
Earth, where the cries of hunger can be heard day or night around the globe,
and the ice caps are melting, and the rainforest is burning to the ground. It is
hard to know where to step next, what to do next, and how to think about our
place and purpose in the grand scheme of life. Yet what is becoming
increasingly clear to me and others, in the face of this chaos, is that each of us
needs to try and remain calm. We just need to take a deep breath. Are we all
part of God—everything, everywhere, simultaneously? Do things not exist
just because we cannot see them? Are time, chaos, and coincidence artificial
constructs created out of our ignorance? Why do we kill things that are ugly
or that we don’t understand? Do feelings of love have physical power? Are
we really the most intelligent life form, when we don’t even understand the
language of other creatures on our own planet? Is it possible to make God
proud of us through our own accomplishments? Would these collective
accomplishments lead to further evolution? Do organized religion and money
hold us back from evolution? Would our ultimate evolution bring us into true
consciousness and oneness with God? Is life a dream?
172
Teilhard’s attempts to combine Christian thought with modern science
and traditional philosophy aroused widespread interest and controversy
when his writings were published in the 1950s. Teilhard aimed at a metaphysic
of evolution, holding that it was a process converging toward a final unity
that he called the Omega point. He attempted to show that what is of
permanent value in traditional philosophical thought can be maintained
and even integrated with a modern scientific outlook if one accepts that the
tendencies of material things are directed, either wholly or in part, beyond
the things themselves toward the production of higher, more complex, more
perfectly unified beings. Teilhard regarded basic trends in matter—
gravitation, inertia, electromagnetism, and so on—as being ordered toward
the production of progressively more complex types of aggregate. This
process led to the increasingly complex entities of atoms, molecules, cells,
and organisms, until finally the human body evolved, with a nervous system
sufficiently sophisticated to permit rational reflection, self-awareness, and
moral responsibility. While some evolutionists regard man simply as a
prolongation of the Pliocene fauna—an animal more successful than the rat
or the elephant—Teilhard argued that the appearance of man brought an
added dimension into the world. This he defines as the birth of reflection:
animals know, but man knows that he knows; he has “knowledge to the
square.”
Another great advance in Teilhard’s scheme of evolution is the socialization
of mankind. This is not the triumph of herd instinct but a cultural convergence
of humanity toward a single society. Evolution has gone about as far as it can
to perfect human beings physically: its next step will be social. Teilhard saw
such evolution already in progress; through technology, urbanization, and
modern communications, more and more links are being established
between different peoples’ politics, economics, and habits of thought in an
apparently geometric progression. Theologically, Teilhard saw the process
of organic evolution as a sequence of progressive syntheses whose ultimate
convergence point is that of God. When humanity and the material world
have reached their final state of evolution and exhausted all potential for
further development, a new convergence between them and the
supernatural order would be initiated by the parousia, or Second Coming of
Christ. Teilhard asserted that the work of Christ is primarily to lead the material
world to this cosmic redemption, while the conquest of evil is only secondary
to his purpose. Evil is represented by Teilhard merely as growing pains within
the cosmic process: the disorder that is implied by order in process of
realization.
173
Author Whitley Strieber talked about a number of the historical, prophetic,
scientific, and environmental inspirations behind his new novel, The Omega
Point. A verse from the Book of Revelation in the New Testament referred to
a final judgment, which he noticed was numbered 20:12, a coincidence
that led him to believe there could be something to the many prophecies
around the year 2012. “I think that this year (2012) is known at some level of
consciousness to be an indicator year... In the future, when we look back at
that year, we’ll say, ‘yes, that’s the year when it all changed,’” he commented.
The events in his book are set into motion when a solar observatory discovers
increased energy entering our solar system, disturbing Earth, and the sun.
Such a scenario could actually take place, as the patterns of the sun have
been unusual of late, noted Strieber. Also figuring into his plot is the mysterious
white powder gold, said to be used by the ancient Egyptians, and
underground shelters which become a trap for the evil and arrogant when
the major Earth changes begin occurring. The title Omega Point refers to a
moment of transcendence when we go beyond the limits of space and
time, he explained, adding that the signs of a next age are upon us. “We’re
going through the underworld—the birth canal of mankind, being born into
a new level of timelessness and innocence,” he said.
It’s Time for Cosmic Liturgy
“Only the human person, created in the image and likeness of God, is capable of
raising a hymn of praise and thanksgiving to the Creator. The earth, with all its
creatures, and the entire universe call on man to be their voice.” Pope John Paul II.
The whole creation will celebrate at the reaching of Omega point. It will
be the moment of home coming and the perfect reunion back in the garden
where the man broke all the ties and thus lost his image of God. It took
billions of years for man to find the image of God. In the letter to Romans, St.
Paul writes that the world will one day become a form of living worship. At
the end we will have a true cosmic liturgy, where the cosmos becomes a
living host. Imagine those millions of years in the obscurity, with the struggles
and frustrations on their way towards the Omega Point, humanity can be
compared to the bondage in Babylon or in Egypt. Indeed, someday they
found their climax of liberation in the flowering of the Image of God. It is the
time of song and dance. The example of the Easter Vigil ould be the closest
to understand what it really means? Besides light, water, the third great symbol
of the Easter Vigil is something rather different; it has to do with man himself.
It is the singing of the new song: the Alleluia.
174
Easter Vigil
From the early days of the church, the Easter Vigil was the primary means by which
Easter was observed. The Vigil itself can begin at any time after sundown on
Saturday, although there has been a tendency in Protestant churches to begin
just before sunrise on Sunday and conclude the service just after the Gospel
readings while singing praises at sunrise. In more temperate climates, this is often
an outdoor service. In church traditions that observe a Service of Shadows on Good
Friday, the Easter Vigil begins in darkness as a flame is lit. This can either be the
Christ candle returned to the sanctuary or to the worshippers, or a “new fire” lit
amid the darkness. From this “new fire” all the other candles in the sanctuary are
lit. Some churches use a special Paschal Candle as the focal point for this part of
the service. All the worshippers light individual candles from the Paschal candle
as they sing a song of praise. This return of light symbolizes the resurrection of
Jesus from the grave and the light of salvation and hope God brought into the
world through the resurrection, the triumph of the light of God’s grace and salvation
over the darkness of death and sin. If celebrated in a sanctuary, the lights are then
either turned on all at once or in stages as the Scriptures are read, thus reversing
the effects of the Service of Shadows and dramatically symbolizing the “true light
that enlightens everyone” (John 1:9). Of course, if this is done as an Easter sunrise
service outdoors, the spreading dawn serves the same purpose. In any case, the
service intends to celebrate the newness, the fresh possibilities, and new
beginnings out of old endings that Jesus’ resurrection embodies. In the early
church, the Easter Vigil concluded with the baptism of new converts, celebrating
not only Jesus’ resurrection from death to life, but also the new life that God has
brought through the death and resurrection of Jesus to individual believers. Those
baptized changed into new white clothes to symbolize their new life in Christ,
which is the origin of the tradition of buying new clothes at Easter. Although Easter
baptism is rarely practiced today among Protestants, the Anglican practice of
renewing baptismal vows during the Easter Vigil is becoming popular. An ancient
tradition from the early centuries of the church intensifies the fasting of Lent, so
that no food of any kind is eaten on Holy Saturday, or for forty hours before sunrise
on Easter Sunday. The breaking of the fast is the Eucharist or Communion that is
celebrated at Easter sunrise at the end of the Easter Vigil.
When a person experiences great joy, he cannot keep it to himself. He
has to express it, to pass it on. But what happens when a person is touched by
the light of the resurrection, and thus comes into contact with life itself, with
Truth and Love? He cannot merely speak about it. Speech is no longer adequate.
He has to sing. The first reference to singing in the Bible comes after the
crossing of the Red Sea. Israel has risen out of slavery. It has climbed up from
the threatening depths of the sea. It is as it were reborn. It lives and it is free.
175
The Bible describes the people’s reaction to this great event of salvation
with the verse: the people ‘believed in the Lord and in his servant Moses’
(Exodus 14:31). Then comes the second reaction which, with a kind of inner
necessity, follows from the first one: ‘Then Moses and the Israelites sang this
song to the Lord …’ At the Easter Vigil, year after year, we Christians intone
this song after the third reading, we sing it as our song, because we too,
through God’s power, have been drawn forth from the water and liberated
for true life.
There is a surprising parallel to the story of Moses’ song after Israel’s
liberation from Egypt upon emerging from the Red Sea, namely in the book
of Revelation of St. John. Before the beginning of the seven last plagues
imposed upon the earth, the seer has a vision of something like ‘a sea of glass
mixed with fire; and those who had conquered the beast and its image and
the number of its name, standing beside the sea of glass with harps of God
in their hands. And they sing the song of the Lamb …’ (Revelation 15:2ff ).
This image describes the situation of the disciples of Jesus Christ in every
age, the situation of the Church in the history of this world. Humanly speaking,
it is self-contradictory. On the other hand, the community is located at the
Exodus, in the midst of the Red Sea, in a sea which is paradoxically ice and
fire at the same time. And must not the Church, so to speak, always walk on
the sea, through the fire and the cold? Humanly speaking, she ought to sink.
But while she is still walking in the midst of this Red Sea, she sings: she
intones the song of praise of the just; the song of Moses and of the Lamb, in
which the Old and New Covenants blend into harmony. While, strictly
speaking, she ought to be sinking, the Church sings the song of thanksgiving
of the saved. She is standing on history’s waters of death and yet she has
already risen.
Singing, she grasps at the Lord’s hand, which holds her above the waters.
And she knows that she is thereby raised outside the force of gravity of
death and evil; a force from which otherwise there would be no way of
escape; raised and drawn into the new gravitational force of God, of truth
and of love. At present she is still between the two gravitational fields. But
once Christ is risen, the gravitational pull of love is stronger than that of hatred;
the force of gravity of life is stronger that that of death. Perhaps this is actually
the situation of the Church in every age? It always seems as if she ought to be
sinking, and yet she is always already saved. St Paul illustrated the situation
with the words: we are ‘as dying, and see, we are alive’ (2 Corinthians 6:9).
The Lord’s saving hand holds us up, and thus we can already sing the song of
the saved, the new song of the risen ones: Alleluia!
176
Bibliography
1.
The Angels in Religion and Art by Valentine Long, OFM, Franciscan
Herald press, Chicago, Illinois, 1970.
2.
Christian Anthropology by John F. O’Grady, Paulist Press, New York,
1976.
3.
Cradle of Humankind by Brett Hilton-Barber and Prof. Lee R. Berger,
Struik Publishers, Cape Town, South Africa, 2002.
4.
No Man is an Island by Margaret Archer, The Tablet, London, 18th July,
2009.
5.
Salt-King of Flavors by Shaheed Perveen, Selamta, The Inflight
Magazine of Ethiopian Airlines, Volume 26, January-March 2009.
6.
The Discovery of Lucy (Denkenesh) by John Reader, Selamata, The
Inlight Magazine of Ethiopian Airline, Volume 25, January to March
2008, Addis Ababa.
7.
The Hard Sayings of Jesus by F.F. Bruce, Hodder & Toughton, Auckland,
New Zealand, 1995.
8.
Celebrations of Life by Rene Dubois, McGraw Hill Book Company,
New York, 1982.
9.
A Primer for Pessimists by Alice Park, Time Magazine, April 6, 2009,
New York.
10.
The Homily of Pope Benedict XVI, on Easter Vigil titled as ‘The
Resurrection Song,’ Published in “The Tablet” 18 April, 2009.
11.
Resources on ‘Australopithecus afarensis’ from the National Museum
of Ethiopia, Addis Ababa.
12.
Resources on ‘Hominids’ from the National Museum of Uganda,
Kampala.
13.
The Discoveries by Daniel J. Boorstein, Vintage Books, New York, 1985.
14.
The Tablet, Edited by Catherine Pepinster, Published by The Tablet
Publishing Company, London, UK.
15.
The Biochemical Basis of Neuropharmacology by J.R. Cooper, F.E.
Bloom, R.H. Roth, Oxford University Press, London, 1991.
177
16.
A Source Book of Indian Philosophy by S. Radhakrishnan and C.A.
Moore, Princeton, England, 1957.
17.
Sri Sathya Sai Baba and The Future of Mankind by S.P. Ruhela, Sai Age
Publications, New Delhi, 1991.
18.
The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence by Thomas R. MacDonough,
John Wiley and Sons, New York, 1987.
19.
It’s a Matter of Survival by Anita Gordon and David Suzuki, Harper
Collins Publishers, UK, 1991.
20.
Is Anyone out There? By Frank Drake and David Sobel, Delacorte
Publishers, New York, 1992.
21.
The End of History and the Last Man by Francis Fakuyama, The Free
Press, New York, 1992.
22.
Interstellar Migration and the Human Experience by Ben R. Finney
and Eric M. Jones, University of California Press, Berkely, 1985.
23.
Understanding the Present: Science and the Soul of Modern Man,
Picador/Pan Books Limited, London, UK, 1992.
24.
Beyond Evolution. The Genetically Altered Future of Plants, Animals,
the Earth and Humans … by Dr. Michael W. Fox. The Lyons Press, New
York, 1997.
25.
Life as we do not Know it. The NASA Search for Alien Life by Peter
Ward. Viking Publications. U.S.A. 2005.
26.
The Greatest Show on Earth. The Evidence for Evolution by Richard
Dawkins. Free Press, Sydney, Australia, 2009.
27.
Our Inner Ape. A Leading Primatologist Explains Why We are Who we
are by Frans de Waal. Riverhead Books, 2005.
28.
Why Evolution is true by Jerry A. Coyne. Viking. Penguin Publications.
New York, 2009.
29.
99 % Ape. How Evolution Adds up? By Jonathan Silvertown. The
University of Chicago Press, USA, 2008.
30.
Future Evolution. An Illuminated History of Life to come, by Peter
Ward. A W.H. Freeman Book, Times Books, Henry Hoit and Company,
New York, 2001.
178
Three Engines
That Power Human Evolution
1. Religion
2. Science
3 Language, Culture and Art
Chapter III
Engine Number One - Religion
Role of Good Old Pesky Religions in Human Evolution
“One’s own religion is after all a matter between oneself and one’s Maker;
and no one else’s.” M.K. Gandhi.
The following presentation is based on a poem by Al Rudi, a Persian
Poet and Islamic mystic in 12th century, titled “His Word.” The poem sums
up the everlasting quest for God in every part of the Universe:
“God whispered gently to a rose asleep with petals furled.
At once she opened wide her heart and smiled upon the world!
Again God murmured softly to a cold and lifeless stone.
Then from it sprang a thousand gems, like stars from heaven’s throne!
Another word God spoke to bid the sun come out and play.
To dance on water, field and hill and bless us with the day!
But oh! What secret word he keeps for one alone to learn.
To share his greatest gift of all and so that gift return.
Ah yes! We hear that gentle word, insistent from above.
And every human heart can know his word to us is “Love.”
The word “religion” comes from the Latin for “binding together”, to
connect that which has been sundered apart. Today, perhaps for the first
time in history, the whole world is becoming pluralistic in terms of
religions; the various religions were once generally confined to specific
geographical areas. Hinduism was at home in India, Buddhism in East and
Southeast Asia, Christianity in Europe. Now there are Christians in India,
Africa, Buddhists in U.S.A and Europe, Hindus in Australia. The mission
field has become the whole world. Moreover, there is a growing militancy
and mission-mindedness in non-Christian religions, stimulated in part by
a reaction to Christian missions. No longer are Christian missionaries the
only ones preaching on the streets of cities and in rural villages. In truth,
mission is a very old habit of religions. When did religions begin? No one
knows for sure! There are suggestions of religion in Neanderthal burials
and on European cave walls, where painted stick figures may represent
shamans, early religious specialists. Nevertheless, any statement about when,
where, why, and how religion arose or any description of its original nature
can only be speculative! However, although such speculations are
inconclusive, many have revealed important functions and effects of
religious behavior. Religion is a cultural universal. It consists of beliefs
and behavior concerned with supernatural beings, powers, and forces.
Cross-cultural studies have revealed many expressions and functions of
religion. These include explanatory, emotional, social, and ecological
functions. People may use magic to try to influence outcomes over which
they have no technical or rational control. Religion can provide comfort
and psychological security at times of crisis. Although all religions were
initially founded with the aim of purifying men and women and helping
them to lead ethical lives through prayer, it was found in some instances
that blind traditions, customs and superstition often resulted in not the
cathartic effects of religion, but the spread of communalism, fanaticism,
fundamentalism and discrimination.
The Opaqueness of Prehistoric Documents on Religion
The domestication of fire that is, the possibility of producing,
preserving, and transporting it, marks, we might say, the definitive
separation of early humans from their zoological predecessors. The most
ancient document for the use of fire dates from “Choukoutien” (about
600,000 BC), 1 but its domestication probably took place much earlier
and in several places. These few well-known facts needed, so that the
reader will bear in mind that prehistoric man already behaved in the
manner of a being endowed with intelligence and imagination. If the
early humans are regarded as complete men, it follows that they also
possessed a certain number of beliefs and practiced certain rites. The
experience of the sacred constitutes an element in the structure of
consciousness. If today there is agreement on the fact that the early
humans had a religion, in practice it is difficult, if not possible, to determine
what it content was. The investigators, however, have not cried defeat;
for there remain a certain number of testimonial documents for the life of
the early humans, and it is hoped that their religious meaning will one
day be deciphered. The documents are, in fact, comparatively numerous,
but they are “opaque” (shrouded in mystery) and not very various: human
bones, especially skulls, stone tools, pigments (most abundantly red ocher,
hematite), various objects found in burials. It is only from the late Paleolithic
that we have rock paintings and engravings, painted pebbles, and bone
and stone statuettes. In certain cases (burials, work of art) and within the
Choukoutien Caves in China, where skulls of Sinanthropus, known as Peking Man and
seven skulls of more recent Stone Age people were found.
1
181
limits, there is at least the certainty of a religious intention, but the majority
of the documents from before the Aurignacian (30,000 BC) 2 that is, tools
that reveal nothing beyond their utilitarian value. A tool, be it prehistoric
or contemporary, can reveal only its technological intention; all that its
producer or its owners thought, felt, dreamed, hoped in relation to it
escapes us. But we must at least try to imagine the nonmaterial values of
prehistoric tools.
For some two million years, our early ancestors lived chiefly by
hunting, fishing, and gathering. But the first archaeological indications in
respect to the religious universe of the Paleolithic hunter go back only to
Franco-Cantabrian rock art (30,000 BC). What is more, if we examine the
religious beliefs and behavior of contemporary hunting peoples, we
realize the almost complete impossibility of proving the existence or the
absence of similar beliefs among the early humans. Primitive hunters
regard animals as similar to men but endowed with supernatural powers;
they believed that a man can change into an animal and vice versa; that
the souls of the dead can enter animals; finally mysterious relations exist
between a certain person and a certain animal (this used to be termed
“nagualism”). As for the supernatural beings documented in the religions
of hunting peoples, we find that they are of various kinds; spiritual
companions or guardian spirits, divinities of the type supreme being,
Lord of wild beasts, which protect both the game and the hunter; spirits
of the bush and spirits of the different species of animals. The richness
and complexity of the religious ideology of hunting peoples must never
be underestimated, and likewise the almost complete impossibility of
proving or denying its existence among the early humans. As, has often
been said: beliefs and ideas cannot be fossilized. Homo sapiens is at the
same time Homo religiosus. The earliest and most numerous documents
are, obviously, bones. From the Mousterian (70,000 to 50,000 BC) 3 we
can speak certainly of burials. Belief in a survival after death seems to be
demonstrated, from the earliest times, by the use of red ocher as a ritual
substitute for blood, hence as a symbol of life. We may say that the burials
confirm the belief in survival and furnish some additional details: burials
oriented toward east, showing an intention to connect the fate of the
soul with the course of the sun, hence the hope of a rebirth, that is, of a
2
Prehistoric European culture, associated with Cro-Magnon people in Europe around
the period 30,000 to 22,000 BC.
3
A prehistoric culture of the Paleolithic period in Europe, North Africa, and
southwestern Asia associated with the Neanderthals and marked by the use of flint tools.
182
post-existence in another world; belief in the continuation of a specific
activity; certain funeral rites, indicated by offerings of objects of personal
adornment and by the remains of meals.
Rock Paintings: Images and Symbols - The most important and
numerous figurative documents have been provided by the exploration
of decorated caves. Since the paintings are found at a considerable
distance from the entrance, investigators agree in regarding the caves as
a sort of sanctuary. Besides, many of these caves were uninhabitable, and
difficulties of access reinforced their numinous character. To reach the
decorated walls it is necessary to proceed for hundreds of meters, as in
the case of the Niaux and Trois Freres caves, in France. The Cabarets cave
is a real labyrinth, a journey through which takes several hours. At Lascaux,
access to the lower gallery, which contains one of the masterpieces of
Paleolithic art, is obtained by descending a rope ladder through a shaft 7
meters deep. It is also probable that rites were performed in the deepest
parts of these sanctuaries, perhaps before a hunting expedition or on the
occasion of what could be termed the “initiation” of adolescents. The
intentionality of, these painted or engraved art seems to be supernatural,
beyond doubt. Surrounded by the northern fringe of the Vindhyan ranges
in India, Bhimbetka lies 46 km south of Bhopal.
Bhimbetka Caves
Bhimbetka is known to have the first traces of human existence in India. Declared
as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO, the Bhimbetka Caves were undiscovered till
recently when it was found hidden in the midst of thick vegetation and dense
forest. The caves were discovered by Indian Dr Wakankar in the year 1958. There
are about 600 caves in all filled with paintings of various activities of the cave
dwellers. These caves are the largest collection of prehistoic caves in India. Just
47 kms from the capital city of Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh in the Vindyachal hills
lie the caves of Bhimbetka. It is believed that Bhima, one of the five Pandavas of
Mahabharata, the Hindu Epic is associated with the location. Bhimbetka is hence
named after Bhima. The caves or rock shelters have ancient prehistoric aboriginal
paintings depicting the lives and times of people of the Stone Age, living in these
caves. The scenes painted on the walls include animals around by them like wild
buffalo, tigers, and rhinoceros. The scenes also depict their lives like dance,
religious rituals and childbirth. Other paintings depict the tools they used for
cooking, hunting and other purposes. The natural colors used by them like red
and white pigments from vegetable dye are preserved till date. The oldest
painting of the Bhimbetka Caves dates back to more than 12000 years. These
caves form a part of the UNESCO as they have paintings of all over them
183
representing three major periods of history—Upper, Paleolithic and the Medieval
Period. The Caves have archeological significance as they depict 7 different
periods of history. These paintings can be divided into five major historical periods:
The First is Upper Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. In these one can see the wild
animals painted on the walls of the caves. Huge figures of bisons, deer, tigers and
rhinoceroses make the major part of these Paleolithic paintings. The second is
Mesolithic Paintings: Here some improvements can be seen in the paintings. The
paintings now are more refined with linear decorations on the body of human
beings, hunting scenes, music and dance festivals. The third is Chaleolithic Period.
These paintings depict the mixing up of the cave man with the agricultural
communities of the Malwa Plains. The fourth is Early Historic Period. Here one
can see the drawings of yaksh, tree gods and sky chariots. Painted mainly in red
and yellow these depict the riders, tunic like dresses, scripts and religious symbols.
The fifth is Medieval Period. Geometric and schematic pictures and paintings are
found in this period. But these paintings show crudeness in their artistic style. In
these cave paintings the use of crude chipped stone tools has been done in
abundance along with the use of twig brushes dipped into charcoal and plant
extracts has been done here. What is most interesting is the existence of these
paintings even after such long period! Also these paintings on the bear
resemblance to the Upper Palelithic Lascaux cave Paintings in France and Kakadu
National Park in Australia.
In this rocky terrain of dense forest and craggy cliffs, over 600 rock
shelters belonging to the Neolithic Age were recently discovered. Here,
in vivid, panoramic detail, paintings in over 500 caves depict the life of
the prehistoric cave dwellers, making the Bhimbetka group an
archaeological treasure, an invaluable chronicle in the history of man.
Executed mainly in red and white with the occasional use of green and
yellow, with themes taken from the everyday events of aeons ago, the
scenes usually depict hunting, dancing, music, horse and elephant riders,
animals, fighting, honey collection, decoration of bodies, disguises,
masking and household scenes. Popular religious and ritual symbols also
occur frequently. The drawings and paintings can be classified under
different periods: Upper Paleolithic, with bisons, tigers and rhinoceroses;
Mesolithic, comparatively small in size with birds, communal dances,
musical instruments, men carrying dead animals, drinking and burials
appear in rhythmic movement: Chaleolithic with pottery and agricultural
products; Early Historic with riders, depiction of religious symbols and
religious beliefs are represented by figures of “yakshas”, tree gods and magical
sky chariots; Medieval with geometric paintings more schematic and more
colorful suggesting religious influence.
184
The Spiritual Ape
After all, it is not the stones and bones, the technology and art that
deserve top billing in our prehistory; it is material culture’s emotional
back-story that does. Throughout the millennia, hominid mothers nurtured
their children; siblings played with each other and with their friends;
adults shifted alliances, supporting first this friend, then another, against
a rival. The emotional dependency of ape infants on their mothers and
other relatives only deepened and lengthened as the human lineage
began to evolve, a fact with cascading consequences for the hominids’
whole lives. Emotions, before, after, and during the Neanderthal period,
are created when individuals act together and make meaning together,
starting in infancy. The excitement in understanding human evolution is
centered in tracing this mutual creativity and meaning making, indeed in
tracing the evolution of belongingness. The hominid need for
belongingness rippled out, eventually expanding into a wholly new realm.
In tandem with and in part driven by, changes in the natural environment,
in the hominid brain, and most important, in care-giving practices,
something new emerged that went beyond empathy, rule-following, and
imagination within the family and immediate group, and that went
beyond consciousness expressed through action and meaning-making
in the here and now. Language and culture became more complex as
symbols and ritual practices began to play a more central role in how
hominids made sense of their world. An earthly need for belongingness
led to the human religious imagination and thus to the otherworldly realm
of relating with God, gods, and spirits.
From the building blocks we find in apelike ancestors emerged the
soulful need to pray to gods, to praise God with hymns, to shake in terror
before the power of invisible spirits, to fear for one’s life at the hands of
the unknown or to feel bathed in all-enveloping love from the heavens.
To express in straightforward language the profound depth of this human
emotional connection to the sacred is a challenge. The inaccessibility to
language of the sacred experience mirrors what Martin Buber writes about
when he describes human relating with God: it “is wrapped in a cloud but
reveals itself, it lacks but creates language. We hear no You and yet we feel
addressed; we answer—creating, thinking, acting: with our being we speak
the basic word, unable to say You with our mouth.” Buber’s I and Thou is a
wonderful (in the word’s literal sense) lead-in to understanding my thesis.
Buber says that “all actual life is encounter,” that “in the beginning is the
185
relation,” that “man becomes an I through a You.” This is so and has been
so for a very long time in our prehistory. What’s so beautiful and
compelling about the human religious imagination in all its ineffable
relating is how it emerges from its evolutionary precursors and yet
completely transfigures them.
The study of evolution has uncovered invaluable information about
many aspects of human behavior and culture, from the physiology of our
bodies and brains to the development of hunting, technology, and social
groups. But an understanding of the intangibles of human experience,
especially religion, lags far behind. Attempts to discover the source of
religiosity through genetic analysis and neuroscience have so far yielded
intriguing but incomplete insights. Evolving God represents an exciting
breakthrough. Drawing on her own extensive investigations into the
behavior of our closest primate relatives and the most up-to-date research
in archaeology, anthropology, and biology, Barbara King offers a
comprehensive, holistic view of how and why religion came to be. King
focuses on how the Great Apes, our human ancestors, and modern humans
relate to one another socially and emotionally, and she traces the growing
complexities of communication throughout the course of evolution. She
shows that, with increased brain capacity, the scope and nature of socioemotional ties began with one-to-one relationships and expanded to
group relationships (families and communities) and then to connections
with long-dead ancestors, animal spirits, and “higher beings.” Her incisive,
highly readable narrative takes readers from the earliest common relative
of humans and apes (more than 6 million years ago), through the
Neanderthal period and the Stone Age, to the dawn of religion in early
human societies. Evolving God explores one of the greatest mysteries in
human history—the question of whether humankind is innately religious—
and provides evidence that will have a tremendous impact on current
debates about evolution, creationism, and intelligent design. We humans
crave emotional connection with others. This deep desire to connect
can be explained by the long evolutionary history we shared with other
primates, the monkeys and apes. At the same time, it explains why humans
evolved to become the spiritual ape—the ape that grew a large brain,
the ape that stood up, the ape that first created art, but, above all, the ape
that evolved God. A focus on emotional connection is an exciting way to
view human prehistory, but it is not the traditional way. Millions of years
of human evolution are most often recounted as a series of changes in
the skeletons, artifacts, and big, flashy, attention-grabbing behaviors of
186
our ancestors. Medium-size skulls with forward-jutting jaws morph into
skulls with high foreheads, large enough to house a neuron-packed
human brain.
Bones of the leg lengthen and shape-shift over time, so that a foot
with apelike curved toes becomes a foot that imprints the sand just the
way yours and mine do as we stroll along the surf. Crudely modified tools
made of rough stone develop gradually into objects of antler and bone,
delicately fashioned and as much symbolic as utilitarian. Caves, at first
refuges for Neanderthal hunters seeking shelter from hungry bears and
other carnivores, become colorful art galleries when Homo sapiens begins
to paint the walls with magnificent images of the animals they hunt.
Stones, bones, and “big” behaviors like tool-making and cave-painting
do change over time as our ancestors evolve, and much of what we can
learn about these transformations is enlightening.
Homo religious: The Axial Age –The Birth of Conscience
From the time the first Homo sapiens evolved, and probably somewhat
earlier than that, humans have felt in touch not only with the tangible
world but also with something beyond, the essences of nature, the spiritual
world of their ancestors, the power of the gods. The result has been the
elaboration of mythologies to contain and explain the world, religions in
many forms. One anthropologist has calculated that, since the beginning
of true humanity, more than 100,000 different religions have arisen, most
of which have decayed with their creators. “The predisposition to religious
belief, is the most complex and powerful force in the human mind and in
all probability an ineradicable part of human nature,” comments the
Harvard biologist Edward O. Wilson. The drive to religion is the urge to
explain the unknowable, often by mythic tales and demanding faith. Of
many characteristics that we can point to as separating us from the rest
of nature, religion is surely among those undeniably unique to the human
species. As a result, mythology and religion have been a part of all human
history, and, even in this age of science, probably will remain so. No one
has thought or written more extensively about mythology than the late
Joseph Campbell. The lesson of mythology, he said, is as powerful as it is
simple. The elements of mythology, through space and time, confirm
“the unity of the race of man, not only in its biology but also in its spiritual
history.” To the earliest members of Homo sapiens, and to societies through
much of human history, life was played out in full interaction with other
powers in the world. The interaction assumed, if not fully human qualities
in these powers, then at least some human qualities.
187
The migratory herd had to be treated with respect; otherwise it would
refuse to return next season. Appropriate gifts had to be made to the sun;
otherwise it would become angry and not rise. The spring had to be
constantly blessed otherwise it would choose to flow elsewhere. As
hunters and gatherers our ancestors relied heavily on animals as resources.
They included these animals in their myths. They were
anthropomorphized in terms of their “intentions,” and often took on special
roles in people’s interaction with “spirit worlds,” sometimes representing
sources of power. Frequently, animal images are distorted, becoming
part human and part beast, an expression of the ambiguity of life, an
elision of human, animal, and spirit worlds. The ultimate expression of this
anthropomorphism, of course, is the creation of gods. “The Old Testament
states that God created man in His own image,” note Gordon Gallup and
Jack Maser. “We would argue that the opposite has occurred. Because of
our capacity to use personal experience as a means of understanding
the experience of others and because of the well-studied phenomenon
of generalization, humans create Gods, in their own image, and not viceversa.” As well as being intelligent animals we are also “spiritual” beings.
Another way of affirming our spiritual nature is to say that we are religious
animals with an inbuilt tendency to experience the natural world in terms
of the supra-natural. It was the anthropologists R.R. Marett who first suggested
that Homo sapiens could better be called Homo religiosus!
For according to many anthropologists there are signs of a religious
concern in the earliest evidences that we have of human behavior. The
Neanderthals, as long as a hundred thousand years ago, placed food and
precious flint implements in the graves of their dead; and the CroMagnons of some twenty-five thousand years ago buried weapons,
ornaments and food with their dead. These practices clearly express some
notion of an afterlife, and such ritual behaviors, later crystallizing into
consciously formed beliefs, are the earliest surviving expressions of
humanity as a religious animal. However, around the middle of the first
millennium BC, in a band of time stretching from about 800 to about 200
BC, remarkable individuals appeared across the world, standing out from
their societies and proclaiming momentous new insights. In China there
were Confucius, Mencius and Lao-Tzu (or the anonymous writers of the
Tao Te Ching) and Mo-Tzu. In India there were Gautamas, the Buddha;
Mahavira, the founder of the Jain traditions; the writers of the Upanishads
and later of the Bhagvad Gita. In Persia there was Zoroaster. In Palestine
there were the great Hebrew prophets: Amos, Hosea, Jeremiah, the Isaiah,
188
and Ezekiel. In Greece there were Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle.
This immensely significant hinge in human thought has come to be known
as “the axial age.” If we see Christianity as presupposing the Judaism: and
Islam as presupposing both Judaism and Christianity, all of the present
major world religions trace their roots to this axial period.
Pre-axial or archaic people generally just accepted the given
conditions of their lives. They did not stand back in thought to engage in
critical reflection. They did not envisage alternatives that might lead to a
fundamental dissatisfaction with the existing state of affairs. Life was for
them, as one anthropologist puts it, “a one-possibility thing.” But during
the axial age, in large areas of the world, there were several mutually
reinforcing developments: the formation of cities; the emergence of
individual as distinguished from communal consciousness, first in rulers
and religious leaders and then increasingly widely; and a sense of the
un-satisfactoriness, the felt incompleteness of our ordinary human
existence, found somehow lacking in a higher quality that nevertheless
stands before us as a real possibility. These extraordinary individuals
emerged, of course, within societies that had through long gradual
change become ready to hear them. And because their messages were
addressed to individuals, challenging them to a personal response, these
messages were for the first time universal in scope. Instead of being
concerned to preserve the existing framework of meaning, they were
conscious of its deeply incomplete and unsatisfying character, and
proclaimed a limitlessly better possibility for the individual, and thus
ultimately for society.
Some Characteristics of Popular Religions
I want to look now at the essential characteristics and constituents of
the people’s deep religious experience. I want to pick out for the moment
just eight important elements:
1. The Body – Popular religious experience, is essentially expressed
through the human body: in dance, music, food, clothing and health.
The body that participates in religious actions is a body that is clearly
sexual and which lives the religious dimensions in its sexuality.
2. The Community – Religious activity is profoundly communal; it creates
community and seeks to strengthen it. In community all take part in
and all enjoy the religious experience. There are disciplines and
boundaries, there are specific functions and offices, but there are
189
generally no hierarchies and authoritarianism in the most of great
religions, except in one or two. Most religions are democratic except for
few monarchies. Religious experience is marked by solidarity, sharing
and tenderness, expressed physically in embraces, kisses and
community symbols.
3. The Cosmos – It is not just men and women who take part in religious
experience, but the whole cosmos: sun, moon, the earth, trees, flowers,
water, animals, stones, and so on. Everything is included in religious
activity, and the cosmic and the human form a single family, in which
the cosmic is not only symbolic but the very body of God.
4. Women – In popular religious celebrations, and in indigenous and
Afro-American celebrations, women have a special leadership role.
Women are included in prominent places in rites and sacred ministries.
5. True Religion is Never Selfish – In ancient Palestine, politics played a
major part in pagan religions such as the worship of Baal-rebirth.
Governments often went so far as to hire temple prostitutes to bring in
additional money. In many cases a religious system was set up and
supported by the government so the offerings could fund community
projects. Religion became a profit-making business. In Israel’s religion,
this was strictly forbidden. God’s system of religion was designed to
come from an attitude of the heart, not from calculated plans and
business opportunities. It was also designed to serve people and help
those in need, not to oppress the needy. Is your faith genuine and
sincere, or is it based on convenience, comfort, and availability?
6. True Religion Comes from the Heart - And so the Lord says, “These people
say they are mine. They honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far
away. And their worship of me amounts to nothing more than human laws
learned by rote.” (Isaiah 29:13) The people claimed to be close to God,
but they were disobedient and merely went through the motions;
therefore, God would bring judgment upon them. Religion had become
routine instead of real. Jesus quoted Isaiah’s condemnation of Israel’s
hypocrisy when he spoke to the Pharisees, the religious leaders of his
day (Matthew 15:7-9; Mark 7:6-7). We are all capable of hypocrisy.
Often we slip into routine patterns when we worship, and we neglect
to give God our love and devotion. If we want to be called God’s
people, we must be obedient and worship him honestly and sincerely.
7. True Religion Bears Spiritual Fruit - One morning, as Jesus was returning
to Jerusalem, he was hungry, and he noticed a fig tree beside the road.
190
He went over to see if there were any figs on it, but there were only
leaves. Then he said to it, “May you never bear fruit again!” And
immediately the fig tree withered up. (Matthew 21:18-19) Why did
Jesus curse the fig tree? This was not a thoughtless, angry act, but an
acted-out parable. Jesus was showing his anger at religion without
substance. Just as the fig tree looked good from a distance but was
found fruitless on close examination, so the temple looked impressive
at first glance, but its sacrifices and other activities were hollow
because they were not done to worship God sincerely (see 21:43). If
you only appear to have faith without putting it to work in your life,
you are like the fig tree that withered and died because it bore no
fruit. Genuine faith means bearing fruit for God’s kingdom.
8. True Religion Focuses on God - St. Paul states: “Don’t let anyone lead you
astray with empty philosophy and high-sounding nonsense that come
from human thinking and from the evil powers of this world, and not from
God.” (Colossians 2:8) Paul writes against any philosophy of life based
only on human ideas and experiences. Paul himself was a gifted
philosopher, so he is not condemning philosophy. He is condemning
teaching that credits humanity, not God, with being the answer to
life’s problems. That approach becomes a false religion. There are many
man-made approaches to life’s problems that totally disregard God.
To resist heresy you must use your mind, keep your eyes on God, and
study God’s Word.
Today, we observe among people, signaling that there is also an urgent
need to return to religious roots. The deep or popular religious experience
differs clearly, especially in organized religions. Organized religions are
normally disembodied, de-sexed, anti-cosmic, individualistic,
authoritarian and patriarchal. Through the eight elements mentioned
above, the deep religious experience is able to integrate at a deeper
level, religion and culture: God and culture. In it, ritual, myth and the
religious sense have more force and importance. The revival of religion,
or the return to religious roots, taking place today as a result of the crisis
of modernity, also has all the features of popular religion that I have
described. It is a religion linked to the body, to dance, to music, to food
and sexuality. It is communal and cosmic, with a marked ecological
element and participation by women in crucial roles. The more official
religion represses the body and sexuality, isolates human beings from
their relations as brothers and sisters with other human beings and with
the cosmos, and becomes authoritarian and patriarchal, the more it
191
alienates itself from popular religion and comes into confrontation with
the revival of religion and the religious sense in today’s world. Another
important characteristic of religion is that it is always consistent in supporting
the Human rights. Human rights must be founded on faith. Those fighting for
human rights cannot do so effectively unless their struggle is grounded in
faith. Human rights are ultimately rooted in participation with God. Because
there was a risk that, without this grounding, people’s ideas of human
rights could be contaminated. It was essential that they be purified by
faith. Human reason must undergo constant purification by faith, insofar
as it is always in danger of a certain ethical blindness caused by
disordered passions and sin. It was only as spiritual beings that men and
women were able to distinguish between true and false … good and
evil, better and worse, and justice and injustice. Every person was capable
of discerning the natural law, which was nothing other than a participation
in the eternal law laid down by God. And it was only by respecting this
law and prompting solidarity and oneness that global efforts aimed at
eliminating social inequalities between countries and societies would
be successful. Even though human rights were not truths of faith in a
strict sense, they actually came to full light and received further
confirmation from faith. At the center of all human rights were the right to
life and the right to the freedom of conscience and religion.
Another characteristic in which religion plays a prominent role is
cultural ecology. Behavior motivated by beliefs in supernatural beings,
powers, and forces may help people survive in their material environment.
The people of India worship zebu cattle, which are protected by the
Hindu doctrine of “ahimsa” a principle of nonviolence that forbids the
killing of animals generally. Western economic development experts
occasionally cite the Hindu cattle taboo to illustrate the idea that religious
beliefs can stand in the way of rational economic decisions. Hindus seem
to be irrationally ignoring a valuable food (beef ) because of their cultural
or religious traditions. The economic developers also comment that
Indians don’t know how to raise proper cattle. They point to the scraggly
zebus that wander about town and country. Western techniques of animal
husbandry grow bigger cattle that produce more beef and milk. Western
planners lament that Hindus are set in their ways. Bound by culture and
tradition, they refuse to develop rationally. However, sacred cattle actually
play an important adaptive role in an Indian ecosystem that has evolved over
thousands of years. Peasants’ use of cattle to pull plows and carts is part of
the technology of Indian agriculture. Indian peasants have no need for
192
large, hungry cattle of the sort that economic developers, beef marketers,
and North American cattle ranchers prefer. Indians use cattle manure to
fertilize their fields. Not all the manure is collected, because peasants
don’t spend much time watching their cattle, which wander and graze at
will during certain seasons. In the rainy season, some of the manure that
cattle deposit on the hillsides washes down to the fields. In this way, cattle
also fertilize the fields indirectly. Furthermore, in a country where fossil
fuels are scarce, dry cattle dung, which burns slowly and evenly, is a
basic cooking fuel. Far from being useless, as the development experts
contend, sacred cattle are essential to Indian cultural adaptation.
Biologically adapted to poor pasture land and a marginal environment,
the scraggly zebu provides fertilizer and fuel, is indispensable in farming,
and is affordable for peasants. The Hindu “doctrine of ahimsa” puts the full
power of organized religion behind the command not to destroy a
valuable resource even in times of extreme need.
This human-animal ecological relationship took another turn,
unfortunately when humans misunderstood “their stewardship role” in
nature, prompted by some other new religions. If Hinduism and also the
primitive religions like, totemic, zoomorphic religion, shamanic rites,
Sumerian, Mesopotamian, Minoans, Akkadian and Egyptian, all argue for
the antiquity of human sympathy with other animals, the problem arises
of when humans’ sense of apartness from the other creatures arose, and
when, in particular, it first occurred to people to claim superiority: the gift
of Eden, the lordship or, at least, the stewardship of creation. In view of human
feebleness and inferiority, in physical prowess and direct combat, to so
many of our competitor species, it seems a counter-intuitive claim. Early
heroes of many civilizations tended to be credited with extraordinary
powers of magical sympathy with animals, which sometimes involved power
of domination. Arguments, for instance that Indo-European heroes
included a “Master of Animals” rest on Thracian images of the horseborne hunter; lord and exploiter of the natural world: plaques depicting
him lie defaced and trampled at early Christian shrines, leaving no doubt
of his divine status. In some examples we see him taming horses, wrestling
monsters, and wresting quarry from lion’s maw. But the claim that
humankind as a whole inherited the supremacy of nature cannot be traced
back very far in explicit evidence, not beyond a period well into the first
millennium BC: the “axial age”, when so much of our modern thinking was
initiated or anticipated by sages in the East.
193
The first evidence of a shift in relevant sensibilities occurs, like most
of the “firsts’ of history in that period: in India, in the Upanishads. Those
revolutionary texts developed even older traditions of thought about
human nature, discernible in the Vedas, in which humankind is closely
associated with rational qualities. The Vedic word for humankind:
“manusya” is related to “manyas” (mind) and “man” (thought), from which,
according to the commentary called “The Brahman of a Hundred Paths”,
humans were created. The most famous of Vedic creation hymns puts it
differently, but still with a sense of peculiar human refinement: the creator’s
limbs were the substance from which humans were fashioned, whereas other
animals were made from a kind of chaos of “milk and ghee”. If this suggests
a hierarchical model of creation, with humans ranked higher than other
creatures, the Upanishads add an essential difference that puts humans
not just into a higher rank, but also into a new category of being: a soul, or
“atman”, which is not part of nature at all, but is eternal and immutable.
This was a radical claim, transforming humans from the elite of nature to
a place in super-nature. It anticipated future thinking in all other sedentary
civilizations. The project of prizing people from nature had begun.
Religion is a Face of Humanity!
Religion is a sacred engagement with that which is believed to be a
spiritual reality. Religion is a worldwide phenomenon that has played in
all human culture and so is a much broader, more complex category than
the set of beliefs or practices found in any single religious tradition. An
adequate understanding of religion must take into account its distinctive
qualities and patterns as a form of human experience, as well as the
similarities and differences in religious across human culture. In all
cultures, human beings make a practice of interacting with what are
taken to be spiritual powers. These powers may be in the form of gods,
spirits, ancestors, or any kind of sacred reality with which humans believe
themselves to be connected. Sometimes a spiritual power is understood
broadly as an all-embracing reality (Pantheism), and sometimes it is
approached through its manifestation in special symbols. It may be
regarded as external to the self, internal, or both. People interact with
such a presence in a sacred matter, that is, with reverence and care.
Religion is the term most commonly used to designate this complex and
diverse realm of human experience. In fact, belief in God goes not
suppress the search for truth; on the contrary it encourages it. Saint Paul
exhorted the early followers to open their minds to ‘all that is true, all that
194
is noble, all that is good and pure, all that we love and honor, all that is
considered excellent or worthy of praise.’ (Phil 4:8). Religion of course,
like science and technology, philosophy and all expressions of our search
for truth, can be corrupted. Religion is disfigured when pressed into service
of ignorance or prejudice, contempt, violence and abuse. In this case we see
not only a perversion of religion but also a corruption of human freedom,
a narrowing and blindness of the mind. Clearly such an outcome is not
inevitable. Indeed, when we promote tolerance and understanding, we
proclaim our confidence in the gift of freedom. The human heart can be
hardened by the limits of its environment, by interests and passions. But
every person is also called to wisdom and integrity, to the basic and allimportant choices of good over evil, truth over dishonesty, and can be
assisted in this task.
The call to moral integrity is perceived by the genuinely religious
person, since the God of truth and love and beauty cannot be served in
any other way. Mature belief in God serves greatly to guide the acquisition
and proper application of knowledge. Science and technology offer
extraordinary benefits to society and have greatly improved the quality
of life of many human beings. At the same time the sciences have their
limitations. They cannot answer all the questions about man and his existence.
Indeed the human person, his place and purpose in the universe cannot
be contained within the confines of science. “Humanity’s intellectual
nature finds its perfection ultimately in wisdom, which gently draws the
human mind to seek and to love what is true and good” (cf. Gaudium et
Spes, 15). The use of scientific knowledge needs the guiding light of
ethical wisdom. Such is the wisdom that inspired the Hippocratic Oath4
the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Geneva Convention
and other laudable international codes of conduct. Hence religious and
ethical wisdom, by answering questions of meaning and value, play a
central role in professional formation. And consequently, those facilities
where the quest for truth goes hand in hand with the search for what is
good and noble offer an indispensable service to society. Some maintain
that religion fails in its claim to be, by nature, a builder of unity and
harmony, an expression of communion between persons and with God.
Oath in the Hippocratic Collection, varying versions of which have been taken for
2000 years by physicians entering the practice of medicine. At one time the oath was
ascribed to the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates, but modern research has shown
that it most probably originated in a phyhagorean sect of the 4th century BC. In its original
form, the so-called Hippocratic Oath prohibited participation in abortions. At the height
of Christianity, most European physicians accepted both of these prohibitions.
4
195
Indeed some assert that religion is necessarily a cause of division in our
world; and so they argue that the less attention given to religion in the
public sphere the better. Certainly, the contradiction of tensions and
divisions between the followers of different religious traditions, sadly, cannot
be denied. However, is it not also the case that often it is the ideological
manipulation of religion, sometimes for political ends, that is the real
catalyst for tension and division, and at times even violence in society? In
the face of this situation, where the opponents of religion seek not simply
to silence its voice but to replace it with their own, the need for believers
to be true to their principles and beliefs is felt all the more keenly. Thus,
genuine adherence to religion, far from narrowing our minds, widens the
horizon of human understanding. It protects civil society from the
excesses of the unbridled ego which tend to absolutize the finite and
eclipse the infinite; it ensures that freedom is exercised hand in hand
with truth, and it adorns culture with insights concerning all that is true,
good and beautiful.
This understanding of reason, which continually draws the human
mind beyond itself in the quest for the Absolute, poses a challenge; it
contains a sense of both hope and caution. All major religions are impelled
to seek all that is just and right. We are bound to step beyond our particular
interests and to encourage others, civil servants and leaders in particular,
to do likewise in order to embrace the profound satisfaction of serving
the common good, even at personal cost. And we are reminded that
because it is our common human dignity which gives rise to universal
human rights, they hold equally for every man and woman, irrespective
of his or her religious, social or ethnic group. In this regard, we must note
that the right of religious freedom extends beyond the question of worship
and includes the right, especially of minorities, to fair access to the
employment market and other spheres of civic life. Religious freedom is, of
course, a fundamental human right, and it is our fervent hope and prayer
that respect for the inalienable rights and dignity of every man and
woman will come to be increasingly affirmed and defended not only
throughout India, but in every part of the world. The religious dimension
is in fact intrinsic to culture. It contributes to the overall formation of the
person and makes it possible to transform knowledge into wisdom of life.
For example, in the Pauline teaching, religious formation is not separate
from human formation. The last letters of his correspondence, the socalled ‘pastoral’ letters, are full of significant references to the social and
civil life that followers must keep clearly in mind. St. Paul is a true ‘teacher’
196
who has at heart both the salvation of the person in whom has been
inculcated a mentality of faith, and the person’s human and civil formation,
so that the follower may express to the full a free personality, a human life
that is ‘complete and well prepared’, which is also shown by attention for
culture, professionalism and competence in the various fields of
knowledge for the benefit of all. Consequently the religious dimension is
not a superstructure, it is an integral part of the person from the very earliest
infancy; it is fundamental openness to otherness and to the mystery that
presides over every relationship and every encounter with human beings.
The religious dimension makes the person more human.
Religion is About Belonging
Human search for God is as old as man himself, perhaps written into
his genes. Sometimes I feel that “God gene” is a human trait, necessitated
by natural selection, evolved through mutations and these traits later
passed on to the future generations through sex, enabling the
evolutionary transformation, at the same time following the strict rules of
evolutionary continuity. In highlighting this critical balance between
evolutionary continuity and evolutionary transformation, I want to be
crystal clear about the role of belongingness in the origins of religion. I
see belongingness as one aspect of religiousness—an aspect so essential
that the human religious imagination could not have evolved without it.
In scientific lingo, belongingness is a necessary condition for the evolution
of religion. Over the course of prehistory, belongingness was transformed
from a basic emotional relating between individuals to a deeper relating,
one that had the potential to become transcendent, between people and
supernatural beings or forces. My focus on belongingness distinguishes
my perspective from the dominant one today. In our age of high-tech
science, when gene sequencing and brain-mapping reign supreme, it is
little surprise to find that the most popular theories of the origin of religion
center around properties of genes and brains. Specific geneticbiochemical profiles and inherited brain “modules” devoted to the
expression of religion animate these theories. While something can be
learned from such scenarios, they are sterile to the degree that they fail
to grasp the significance of what matters most: people deeply and
emotionally engaged with others of their kind, and eventually with the
sacred.
That social interactions played a central role in the origins of religion
is not, of course, an original insight. Such an emphasis may no longer be
197
favored, but at least since the time of the pioneering sociologist Emile
Durkheim in the early twentieth century, and indeed since Buber, theorists
have expressed the importance of connections between religion and
social-emotional phenomena. A few theorists continue that trend today.
But as I have indicated, to fully probe the origins of religion, we must look
beyond even the first glimmers of human evolution to examine the
emotional lives of the apes. And so I start the evolutionary clock earlier
than do others who chart the origins of the religious imagination. The
challenge at the heart of this book is to tell the story of the earliest origins
of religion. As is already clear, commitment to an evolutionary perspective
on religion amounts to a claim that humans evolved God gradually and
not via some spiritual big bang. Before moving, in subsequent chapters,
to specifics of the evolutionary perspective itself, it remains to say
something more concrete about religion itself. One linguistic clarification
can be made immediately. By adopting the term “the human religious
imagination,” I do not mean to imply that humans simply make up God,
gods, and spirits in their imaginations. Nor do I claim—nor, indeed, could
I claim—that these sacred beings are real in our world. Matters of faith
are not amenable to scientific analysis, experimentation, or testing; writing
as a biological anthropologist, I remain agnostic on this question. My
focus is on our prehistory, and on how—and why—we evolved God as
that prehistory unfolded.
Many Faces of the Divine
The danger to western culture, manipulated by the media and
psychological techniques, is no
longer one of ‘secularization’ but
Religion of Sigmund Freud
of what J.B. Metz has called
While many of Freud’s theories about
“religion without God,” and the
psychoanalysis are no longer believed
to be fact by most modern
Western interest in Eastern
psychologists, he often had very
religions has often enough been
profound things to say, both about his
motivated by diffuse, dilettante
field of psychology and about other
interest in spiritual comfort and
subjects. Sigmund Freud (born 6 May
private stabilization. But there is
1856, died 23 September 1939) was an
also another truth to which we have
Austrian neurologist and psychologist
to turn at the end of this century,
and the founder of the psychoanalytic
inter-religious communication. The
school of psychology. On the subject of
world is growing together
religion, he had the following things to
economically, politically and
say: A religion, even if it calls itself a
socially; the streams of media
198
information have long ceased to
religion of love, must be hard and
recognize any national or continental
unloving to those who do not
limits. In the Western states, interbelong to it; Religion is an
cultural societies are developing for
illusion and it derives its strength
which native theology is not yet
from the fact that it falls in with
prepared, and the peace of the world will
our instinctual desires; Our
essentially be decided on the readiness of
knowledge of the historical
worth of certain religious
the religions to get to know and respect
doctrines increases our respect
one another better. If, as the Second
for them, but does not invalidate
Vatican Council teaches us, God’s truth is
our proposal that they should
to be found in all religions, then we must
cease to be put forward as the
also note that God is shown to us in
reasons for the precepts of
amazingly many faces. Moreover, since
civilization. On the contrary,
many religious cultures feel that
those historical residues have
monotheistic talk of ‘God’ is an
helped us to view religious
illegitimate limitation, for the sake of
teachings, as it were, as neurotic
dialogue it must be permissible and
relics, and we may now argue
that the time has probably
possible to speak of the ‘divine’ in
come, as it does in an analytic
theological discourse. This ‘divine’ is not
treatment, for replacing the
as remote from the Christian tradition
effects of repression by the
as first impressions might suggest. On
results of the rational operation
the contrary, we Christians, too, know
of the intellect; The whole thing
that we encounter our God only in
is so patently infantile, so foreign
fragments, in reflections and similitude.
to reality, that to anyone with a
Talk of the ‘divine’ need not necessarily
friendly attitude to humanity it
leads to a dilettante attitude; it also
is painful to think that the great
signifies modesty, reverence and a
majority of mortals will never be
able to rise above this view of
readiness to learn from other religions.
life. It is still more humiliating to
The face of humanity could be seen
discover how a large number of
among the multiple religious images of
people living today, who cannot
God. Our aim is to investigate the
but see that this religion is not
multiplicity of concepts, images and
tenable, nevertheless try to
faces of God and the divine in the world
defend it piece by piece in a
religions. This part seeks primarily to
series of pitiful rearguard
describe, compare and indicate
actions.
something of the inexhaustible
multiplicity in which the religions
approach the divine. Contributions from Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism
and Monotheistic Religions are welcomed and they have been
influencing the lives of millions of people. This part, too, is not only
199
description but also analysis, and between the lines there are many
surprises, appeals and questions, especially to the monarchic traditions,
at the same time offering the multiplicities of divine experience. Some
relevant questions asked: how are we to judge our experiences of God?
How do they relate to the salvation and future of humankind, the battle
against injustice and oppression?
Faces of Eternal Themes in Religions
Between the 2 nd century BC and the 1st century AD., stupas were made
at Sanchi and Bharhut, in present-day Madhya Pradesh. Between the
sacred and unadorned form of the stupas and the mundane world beyond,
railings and gateways were made. The railings create a path for the
devotee to walk around the stupa. Stories were depicted on the railings
to remind the worshipper of the virtuous qualities of the Buddha. Jatakas
are used to exemplify the rules of conduct in everyday life. The focus is
not on the personality of the individual Gautama Buddha. The potential
of “Buddhahood” within us is represented by symbols. The wheel
represents enlightenment; footprints and an umbrella over a vacant space
proclaim the presence of an Enlightened One. From the 2 nd century BC
onwards, in the Western Ghats, near the coast of present-day Maharashtra,
India, another magnificent chapter in Buddhist art began unfolding. Over
a period of about a thousand years, more than 1,200 caves were hewn
out of the heart of the hills. Most of these were Buddhist. Leaving behind
the cares and confusions of the material world, the devotee came to
these splendid havens of contemplation. These caves stand in silent
testimony to the peace and majesty of the spirit within us. While homes and
even palaces of kings were made of ephemeral materials like wood,
those that were made in service to the eternal truths, beyond the passing
illusions, that were the subject of art. Hence, only sacred spaces were
made out of lasting material.
About 100km from Aurangabad, India, are the 31 rock-cut caves of
Ajanta. The caves, formed in a horseshoe-shaped gorge of the Waghora
river, were excavated in two phases: first around the 2nd century B.C. and
the second around the 5 th and 6 th century A.D. Cave 10 is the earliest
chaitya-griha and was made in the 2 nd century B.C. the murals found here
are the earliest surviving paintings of the historic period in India. They
are known to be the fountainhead of the classic paintings of Asia. The
Sunga and Satavahana periods were marked by prolific monument
building. The themes and traditions of art formulated then continued in
200
later centuries. In the meantime, changes were taking place in Indian art
in the north of India. In earliest representations only the railings of stupas
and the exteriors of caves presented images of the world as seen around
us. In the heart of the mountain, we were to contemplate that which was
eternal, that which was within. The stupa was simplicity itself. By the 1st
century B.C., images of deities began to be made in Indian art such as a
seated Buddha from Isapur, Mathura, and a Saraswati image from the
Jaina stupa at Kankali Tila, also found near Mathura. Chitrasutra of
Vishnudharmottara, the oldest known treatise on art, says that images of
deities are made to help focus attention on eternal concepts, which are too
abstract to be grasped easily. By the 1st and 2nd centuries A.D., numerous
images of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, Jaina Thirthankaras, Siva, Vishnu,
Kartikeya and other Hindu deities were created. These followed the earlier
models of yakshas and nagas. The form in which the Buddha was presented
was that of an enlightened being, one out of many, with 32 attributes that
identified him as such. The long arms and elongated ear lobes, as well as
the urna, a mark on the forehead, and the ushnisha on the top of the head
are some of the auspicious marks of such a “great being.”
The Hindu, Jain and Buddhist caves at Ellora are among the finest in
India. Unlike the caves at Ajanta, Ellora’s caves were never “lost”, but they
were abandoned and forgotton. There are 34 caves, cut out of the volcanic
lavas of the Deccan Trap as at Ajanta. Twelve are Buddhist, 17 Hindu and
5 Jain. The Kailasanatha Temple is the most magnificent of all the rock-cut
structures at Ellora, and the largest single monolithic structure in the world. It
is the only building that was begun from the top. Carved out of 85,000
cubic meters of rock, the design and execution of the full temple plan is
an extraordinary triumph of imagination and craftsmanship. Excavating
three deep trenches into the rock carving started from the top of the cliff
and worked down to the base. Enormous blocks were left intact from
which the porch, the free standing pillars and other shrines were
subsequently carved. The main shrine was carved on what became the
upper storey, as the lower floor was cut out below. It is attributed to the
Rashtrakuta king Dantidurga (725-55) and must have taken years to
complete. Mount Kailasa (6,700m), the home of Siva, is a real mountain on
the Tibetan Plateau beyond the Himalaya. Its distinctive pyramidal shape,
its isolation from other mountains, and the appearance to the discerning
eye of a swastika etched by snow and ice on its rock face, imbued the
mountain with great religious significance to Hindus and Buddhists alike.
Kailasa was seen as the center of the universe and Siva is Lord of Kailasa:
201
Kailasanatha. To imitate the real snow covered peaks, the sikharas here
were once covered with white plaster. The temple is 50m long and 33m
wide and the tower rises 29m above the level of the court. At the entrance
gate the threshold between the profane and sacred worlds, the goddesses
Ganga and Yamuna form the door jambs. Just inside are two seated sages:
Vyasa, the legendary author of the Mahabharata, and Valmiki to whom
the Ramayana has been ascribed. Ajanta and Ellora have been designated
as a World Heritage Site, to be preserved as an artistic legacy that will
continue to inspire and enrich the lives of generations to come.
The Kushana rulers had their summer capital at Peshawar, in the
Gandhara region5 in north-west India. Buddhism reached this area in the
3 rd century B.C., as we see from the inscriptions of Asoka. The Kanishka
stupa was a monumental stupa established by Kanishka during the 2nd
century CE in today’s Shah-ji-Dheri on the outskirts of Peshawar, Pakistan.
This region was a meeting point of cultures, which traveled on the trade
routes from China to the Mediterranean. Concepts of Indic philosophy,
which placed emphasis on the renunciation of worldly desires, were
new to many here. Emperor Kanishka held the Fourth Buddhist Council in
Kashmir in this region. This was the first time Mahayana Buddhism was
given the full support of royal patronage. The council was also significant
for making the Sanskrit language the main vehicle for Buddhist scriptures.
The Mahayana school of thought that was far less austere than earlier
Buddhism soon gained popularity in the Gandhara region. It also spread
from here to Central Asia and China. The sculptures of this region show
influences of Mediterranean and Persian styles, instead of the spiritual,
idealized forms of the Indic mainstream tradition, these attempt to present
the appearance of people in the world and their everyday expressions.
The drapery also shows the influence of Western models. In the early
Buddhism, the focus was within oneself, on the potential for
enlightenment that is in each of us. In the Gandhara region, the attention
was more towards a heroic personality of the Buddha and other Buddhas
as distinct individuals. Their help could be sought through prayers. The
Jatakas were the subject of the earliest art. These were based on the Indic
philosophic view that saw the unity of all of creation and the cycle of births in
the world of illusory forms. The population of the Gandhara region was not
deeply versed in this philosophy and would have found it simpler to
relate to the life of the individual Gautama Buddha.
5
Historic region in the northwest of ancient India, comprising what is now
northwestern Pakistan. Gandhara was a cultural and trading center for India, Greece,
and Persia that flourished from about the 6th century BC to the 5th century AD.
202
Beyond the world of forms, the stupa had earlier been kept plain.
Now, narrative panels relating the life of the Buddha were placed on it, at
the base. The Four Great Events in the Buddha’s life were presented most
often. Other incidents and legends from his life were also introduced.
Here, the emphasis was more on the drama of life, personified in the
Buddha, before and after enlightenment, became the vehicle of the
message. Depictions in the Gandhara region significantly dramatized
the events of the Buddha’s life and presented them with charged
emotions. The narrative descriptions and figures in the art of Gandhara
were formulated by the end of the 1st century A.D. the sculpture flourished
and was at its best in the 2nd and 3rd centuries. The creation of the Buddhist
art of Gandhara came to an abrupt end in the 5th century, with the invasion
of the Huns. In the meantime, the tradition of art in the northern plains of
India continued to evolve. Mathura continued as a vital centre of Buddhist,
Jaina and Hindu art. Sculptures made here have been found far and
wide. The portrayal of deities had become central to Indic art. These
deities were the personifications of qualities. By meditating upon them, we
awaken the best within us. By meditating upon the Buddha, we hope to awaken
the Bodhi, or true knowledge, within us. This concept of deities traveled
from India to other countries of Asia. It took root everywhere and to this
day the puja, or the worship of deities, continues. The graceful
representations move us and transport us far from worldly concerns to a
peaceful realm within. They are a path to take us away from the pains created
by our desires in the material world.
Face of Liberation in Hinduism
Different theological and philosophical terms are used to elucidate
the dimension of divine presence in the traditions of Hinduism. The
multiplicity of religious traditions and theological systems makes a
systematic account difficult. Furthermore, the term ‘Hinduism’ as a
religious or theological category is by no means certain. It does not appear
in the classic texts and traditions which are regarded as witnesses to the
religion; rather, it was coined in the early nineteenth century by
missionaries and European scholars to denote the different Indian
religions. With it a great variety of religious practices, philosophical
traditions and regional cults were brought under the same heading, and
historical and systematic differences were often neglected. If we look at
the various and sometimes conflicting creeds which it contains, we may
wonder whether Hinduism is not just a name which covers a multitude of
203
different faiths, but when we turn our attention to the spiritual life,
devotion, and endeavor which lie behind the creeds, we realize the unity,
the indefinable self-identity, which, however, is by no means static or
absolute. As a result of the excavations in Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, in
Indus Valley, we have evidence of the presence in India of a highly
developed culture that ‘that must have had a long antecedent history on
the soil of India, taking us back to an age that can only be dimly surmised.
In age and achievement the Indus valley civilization is comparable to
that of Egypt and Sumeria. It is believed that Indus Civilization was inhabited
by settlers called “Aryans”, who came to India in prehistoric times: the land
also was called Aryana or Land of the Aryans. These Aryans came from Central
Asia, like Persia, Afghanistan around 2000 BC. It is a matter for conjecture
whether the Indus people had any relation to the “Dravidians” (native
people). Nor can we say whether the Dravidians were natives of the soil
or came from outside. These Hindu religion, in the first literary records
have come down to us, is that of the Aryans, though influenced by the
Indus people, the Dravidians, and the aborigines. The term “Hindu” was
invented by foreigners, initially probably in the time of the Persian emperor
Darius, who invaded India in the mid-first millennium BC, to refer to the
people of the Indus valley in north-west India, so that in effect it simply
meant “Indian.” However, the concept of Hinduism, as a religion, is a
modern western creation which has been exported to India and become
generally accepted on the sub-continent. Some use the term to cover all
forms of religion originating there, including Buddhism, Jainism and
Sikhism, but most restrict it to those forms that revere the scriptures
known as the Vedas.6 In early Vedic times the gods were very numerous,
coalescing or dividing or changing their character over the centuries in
ways that only mythological thinking permits. They did not disappear
when the idea developed of the one ultimate, ineffable or formless reality,
Brahman. On the contrary, they were now seen as manifestations of
Brahman.
Today’s Hinduism is an amalgam of every tradition to be found in this
country. The religion has absorbed and encompassed local traditions
and gods. Thus deities like Kamakshi of Kanchi, Meenakshi of Madurai, the
Ashta Vinayak of Maharashtra, Balaji of Tirumala, Ranganatha of Srirangam
and Vaishno Devi of the Himalayan foothills may not find themselves in
6
These refer to a collection of ancient Indo-Aryan religious literatures that are
associated with the Indus Civilization and are considered by adherents of Hinduism to
be revealed knowledge.
204
any Vedic text, but have more devotees than the Vedic Gods. There is no
basic text which holds for all traditions (as Bible does), no ‘creed’ binding
on Hindus and no ‘church’ which is an institutional representation of faith
as a whole. However, Hinduism has a predominant influence on
Christianity. There are many similarities between the two religions namely
the use of incense, the sacred bread, reciting prayers on the rosary and
the concept of Trinity as well. In terms of the history of religion ‘Hinduism’
can be said to be the result of the social and religious developments
which took place around the 3 rd century B.C., in the process of
demarcation from Buddhism and Jainism and also from the ancient Vedic
sacrificial religion. At this time a concept of God was developed which
also shaped later theology. The postulate of a concern to preserve the
world order by means of a supporting ritual was taken over from the
Vedic traditions. At the same time, as e.g. in Buddhism, the quest for
redemption from the cycle of death and birth (samsara) and the
connection between action and result was elevated to become an aim.
The doctrines of the individual soul, the ‘self’ (atman), formulated in the
literary genre of the Upanishads (from the 6th century B.C), are particularly
important for the concept of redemption. While this self is entangled in
the consequences of its action (brahman), it is immortal and is to be
redeemed. As the ‘supreme Self ’ God now becomes the guarantor of
redemption. Early witnesses to this development are the Hindu Holy
Book, Bhagavadgita (1 st century B.C) for Visnuism and the Svetasvatara
Upanishad for Sivaism. He alone is to be worshipped ritually, and in him
alone is redemption to be sought. In subsequent centuries this doctrine
of God is developed in the Purana literature and from around the 6th
century in the Samhita (Visnuitic), Agama (Sivaitic) and Tandra (Saktistic)
texts. This God is characterized on the one hand by his being redeemed
and by the tranquility of his divine consciousness and on the other by his
concern for the well-being of those in the world. Thus the divine being
develops in two respects: on the one hand God is unchangeable being, the
supreme soul and completely free. On the other God makes the world come
into being, sustains it and brings about its downfall. The question why an
immutable consciousness causes the visible variety of the world or why
a world created by God is full of suffering was raised time and again by
critics of the doctrine of God.
The Hindu “bhakti” (pious) tradition of fervent devotion to a personal
deity was eventually dominated by the two great figures of Shiva, whose
cosmic dance constitutes the ongoing life of the universe, and Vishnu,
205
with Rama and Krishna as “avatars” or incarnations of Vishnu. And most
practicing Hindus today are either Shaivites or Vaishnavites, depending
usually on where in India they were born. It is an almost universal theme
of Hinduism that we are immersed in “samsara”, the beginningless and
endless round of rebirths through which we live out our “karma”, the
causal effect of our own mental and physical actions. The given
circumstances of life, our genetic make-up, including our sex, our basic
dispositions, our family, our cast (in India) and some of the major events
in our lives, are thought to result from our previous lives. And so life is to be
treated as an opportunity for progress, while there are many other spheres of
existence, it is only in human embodiment that this progress can occur. The
end, the highest goal, is differently conceived within the non-theistic
and the theistic strands of Hinduism. According to Shankara, Indian Advaita
Vedanta philosopher (about 700 AD), our surface personality, or conscious
ego, is only a fleeting material individuation of the universal “atman”,
which is ultimately identical with the eternal Brahman. And so liberation,
both in this life and beyond it, consists in realizing our identity with
Brahman. On the other hand, according to the qualified theistic
“visishtadvaita” philosopher Ramanuja from India (11th century AD), the
material universe, including our human selves, constitutes the “body” of
God, and the ultimate state lies within the divine life, though such a
single-sentence summary cannot do justice to his complex and
fascinating philosophy. But the point at the moment is that the ultimate
state, whether it be identity with the infinite being-consciousness-bliss
of Brahman, or loving communion with the infinite Person, is utterly
desirable. Further, this desirable state can begin to be experienced now.
One who has attained freedom in this life, and is thus a liberated soul
(jivanmukta), has transcended the ego point of view and lives as a source
of light to others. Well-known Indian modern examples of such figures
include Sri Ramakrishna (who died in 1886), Ramana Maharshi (who died
in 1950), Paramahansa Yogananda (who died in 1952), Shakthi Amma in
Vellore and, according to many, Sai Baba (who died in 2011).
In Hinduism, the focus has been less upon sin and guilt and more upon
false consciousness. The religious notion of false consciousness is expressed
metaphysically in the closely connected Hindu concepts of spiritual
ignorance (avidya) and illusion (maya). Hence, great many Hindus do not
actively expect or even seek some post-mortem “salvation” or heaven or
liberation. If at all, this is a distant ideal. Religiously, they are more
concerned just to stay afloat as they continue life’s journey over the
206
hazardous waters of “samsara.” Health, recovery from illness, contentment,
economic security, consolation in distress, offspring, success in various
ventures, protection from various dangers, possibly a happy rebirth: these
are the things that occupy their religious attention. And indeed is this
not, with appropriate variations, the outlook of ordinary religious believers
within each of the great traditions? It is also the case that within the
Hindu picture of the universe there are many hells as well as many
heavens. But these are not in the same category as the heaven and hell of
the western monotheisms. They are levels of existence on which “jiva”
(souls) spend limited periods of time. But the ultimate state, whether
conceived as a union with Brahman in which individual self has been
entirely transcended, or as individual life within the life of God, is eternal
and finally awaits us all. Native theologians believe that, “western concept
of hell” played a very negative role and became an obstacle in
evangelization, made people to reject the notion of punitive God, bringing
missions to dead end. With almost 1 billion followers around the world,
Hinduism is the second largest religious faith on the face of the planet.
Face of Enlightenment in Buddhism
Buddhism and Christianity are replete with principles that have
universal resonance, the sanctity of life, compassion for others, rejection
of violence, confession, and emphasis on charity and the practice of
virtue. Buddhism is a history of experience and thought launched in
northern India some twenty-five centuries ago by Gautama, the Buddha,
and developing ever since within different cultures to form a distinctive
family of tradition. Thus the Buddha’s “anatta” (no substantial self ) teaching
rejected the idea of an eternal unchanging personal core, and the
Buddhist movement rejected the hierarchical caste system of India. When
it moved north early in the Common Era, the Mahayana Buddhism of
China, Tibet, Korea and Japan took forms which are in some ways different
from the southern Theravada Buddhism of Sri Lanka and South-East Asia.
The terms enlightenment, liberation, awakening, nirvana and so on have
both psychological and metaphysical connotations. Some westerners,
usually in reaction against the anthromorphic picture of God as a
limitlessly magnified person, have responded eagerly to Buddhism,
seeing it as essentially a technique for attaining inner peace and serenity
without involving any belief in the Transcendent. The unique history of
Buddhist heritage is the story of a great quest of mankind, a quest to leave
behind the desires and attachments of the world of illusions, a quest to attain
the peace that can only be found within. The concept of samsara, the illusory
207
nature of the material world, underlies the Indian philosophic vision. The
search is constantly to rise above illusion (maya, or mithya), to seek the
truth beyond: to lose our ego and attachments to the objects of the world
around us. To see our oneness with all that there is. Early Indic art embodies
these deep philosophic concepts. It takes us on a journey through the
development of spiritual thoughts, on a path that seeks the goal of the
eternal truth. One of the oldest known sacred forms in India is the Stupa. It is
seen at Buddhist and Jaina sites from early times. A vast mud stupa of the
8 th to the 10th century B.C. was excavated recently near Nalanda in India.
The Dhamma
The Dhamma, the truth taught by the Buddha, is uncovered gradually through
sustained practice. The Buddha made clear many times that Awakening does not
occur like a bolt out of the blue to the untrained and unprepared mind. Rather, it
culminates a long journey of many stages. Just as the ocean has a gradual shelf, a
gradual slope, a gradual inclination, with a sudden drop-off only after a long
stretch, in the same way this Doctrine and Discipline (dhamma-vinaya) has a
gradual training, a gradual performance, a gradual progression, with a
penetration to gnosis only after a long stretch. The Buddha’s teachings are infused
with this notion of gradual development. His method of “gradual instruction”
(anupubbi-katha), which appears in various forms in countless suttas, always
follows the same arc: he guides newcomers from first principles through
progressively more advanced teachings, all the way to the fulfillment of the Four
Noble Truths. At each stage of this “gradual training” (anupubbi-sikkha), the
practitioner discovers a new and important dimension of the law of cause-andeffect—kamma, the cornerstone of Right View. It is thus a very useful organizing
framework with which to view the entirety of the Buddha’s teachings. The gradual
training begins with the practice of generosity, which helps begin the long process
of weakening the unawakened practitioner’s habitual tendencies to cling—to
views, to sensuality, and to unskillful modes of thought and behavior. This is
followed by the development of virtue, the basic level of sense-restraint that
helps the practitioner develop a healthy and trustworthy sense of self. The peace
of mind born from this level of self-respect provides the foundation for all further
progress along the path. The practitioner now understands that some kinds of
happiness are deeper and more dependable than anything that sensegratification can ever provide; the happiness born of generosity and virtue can
even lead to rebirth in heaven—either literal or metaphorical. But eventually
the practitioner begins to recognize the intrinsic drawbacks of even this kind of
happiness: as good as rebirth in wholesome states may be, the happiness it brings
is not a true and lasting one, for it relies on conditions over which he or she
ultimately has no control. This marks a crucial turning point in the training, when
the practitioner begins to grasp that true happiness will never be found in the
realm of the physical and sensual world. The only possible route to an
208
unconditioned happiness lies in renunciation, in turning away from the sensual
realm, by trading the familiar, lower forms of happiness for something far more
rewarding and noble. Now, at last, the practitioner is ripe to receive the teachings
on the Four Noble Truths, which spell out the course of mental training required
to realize the highest happiness: nibbana. Many Westerners first encounter the
Buddha’s teachings on meditation retreats, which typically begin with
instructions in how to develop the skillful qualities of right mindfulness and right
concentration. It is worth noting that, as important as these qualities are, the
Buddha placed them towards the very end of his gradual course of training. The
meaning is clear: to reap the most benefit from meditation practice, to bring to
full maturity all the qualities needed for Awakening, the fundamental
groundwork must not be overlooked. There is no short-cutting this process.
The stupa is a profound symbolic representation of liberation from
the bindings of the material world. Beyond the sculpted gateways (torana)
and railings (vedikas), beyond the great entrances of the rock-cut caves,
beyond the surrounding walls of the temples, lies the most sophisticated
presentation of the philosophic truth. Here is that which takes our attention
away from the multiplicity of the forms of the world to the concept of
the formless eternal. Since early times, stupas were often made by placing
a few pebbles one on top of another. As divinity is seen in the whole of
creation, it is the focus of our attention upon it which creates an object of
worship. All that there is, is a manifestation of the formless eternal, and we
may see that truth in any object we choose to. It is the quality of our
attention, the desire to see beyond the outward material shapes of the
world around us: that is impor tant. The concept is explained in
Vishnudharmottara, which was penned around the 5th century A.D. It is
the oldest known treatise on art and architecture. The high purpose of
life, and of art, is to lift the veils of illusion to see the underlying eternal.
Therefore, Vishnugharmottara says, “The best way in which the eternal is to
be imagined is without form. For seeing the true world, eyes are to be closed
in meditation.” The simplest form is to focus upon that which is beyond,
that which is within. The followers of the Buddha enshrined his mortal
remains in a number of stupas. Thus began a tradition that spread to,
many countries and continues this day. Later stupas housed the remains
of other great teachers, their personal belongings and also Buddhist
teachings. In the 3 rd century B.C., Emperor Asoka 7 is believed to have
7
Asoka, 232 BC, third of the Maurya Dynasty who ruled almost the whole of the Indian
subcontinent. Asoka stands unique among emperors in world today: After successfully
concluding a major military campaign, he was so disturbed by the suffering that it had
caused that he forsook war and thereafter endorsed nonviolence and peaceful persuasion
in consolidating his vast empire.
209
retrieved the Buddha’s holy relics and enshrined them again in stupas
that he constructed across his kingdom. The original stupas, at Amaravati,
Sarnath, Sanchi and Vaishali, were among those made in his time. Asoka’s
monuments had many symbols, such as the “chakra”, which were common
to all Indic faiths. The earliest body of Buddhist art, with images of the life
of the Buddha and the Jatakas (tales of the previous lives of Buddha), was
made during the rule of the Sunga dynasty, in the 2nd and 1st centuries
B.C. the sungas worshipped Hindu deities and were benevolent to the
Buddhist Sanga. In the early Buddhist and Jaina shrines from the 2nd century
B.C. onwards, caves like Ajanta and Ellora, the focus was on meditation.
Forms of the life of the world around us, trees, animals, and humans, were
Ajanta and Ellora
Ajanta and Ellora located near the city of Aurangabad in Maharashtra, the famous
Ajanta and Ellora are cave shrines cut out of rock, by hand, and rank amongst
some of the most outstanding specimens of ancient Ajanta Caves Indian
architectural heritage. The 34 caves at Ellora and the 29 caves at Ajanta, were
remained shrouded in obscurity for over a millennium, till John Smith, a British
Army Officer, accidentally stumbled upon them while on a hunting expedition in
1819. Ajanta has been designated as a World Heritage Site, to be preserved as an
artistic legacy that will come to inspire and enrich the lives of generations to
come. It was only in the 19th century, that the Ajanta group of caves, lying deep
within the Sahyadri hills, cut into the curved mountain side, above the Waghora
river, were discovered. They depict the story of Buddhism, spanning a period from
200 BC to 650 AD. The 29 caves were built as secluded retreats of the Buddhist
monks, who taught and performed rituals in the Chaityas and Viharas, the ancient
seats of learning, and nerve - centers of the Buddhist cultural movement. Using
simple tools like hammer and chisel, the monks carved out the impressive figures
adorning the walls of these structures. Many of the caves house panels depicting
stories from the Jatakas, a rich mine of tales of the several incarnations of the
Buddha. Images of nymphs and princesses amongst others, are also elaborately
portrayed. The Ellora caves, 34 in number, are carved into the sides of a basaltic
hill, 30 kms from Aurangabad. The finest specimens of cave - temple architecture,
they house elaborate facades and exquisitely adorned interiors. These structures
representing the three faiths of Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism, were carved
during the 350 AD to 700 AD period. The 12 caves to the south are Buddhist, the
17 in the centre dedicated to Hinduism, and the 5 caves to the north are Jain. The
sculpture in the Buddhist caves accurately convey the nobility, grace and serenity
inherent in the Buddha. Caves 6 and 10 house images from the Buddhist and Hindu
faith, under the same roof, the latter dedicated to Vishwakarma, the patron saint
of Indian craftsmen. The Vishvakarma cave is both a Chaitya and a Vihara, with a
seated Buddha placed in the stupa. Its two - storied structure sports a colourful
pageant of dwarfs, dancing and making music.
210
made on the railings and gateways. Their representations here help us
appreciate all forms of life in their true perspective, to see them as
reflections of the formless, eternal truth. Beyond the railings and gateways
is the stupa, to point out the truth towards which we must strive, leaving
behind, the attachments to the world.
Face of Awareness in Tao
Tao, a central concept in the ancient Chinese interpretation of the
world, is usually translated ‘way’ in the so-called Western language. And
in Chinese or Japanese (do) Tao in fact means, ‘street’. Tao also means:
supreme-being, logos, meaning, sense, nature, reason, world, and
providence. Tao also means ‘lead’ or ‘show the way’. In the context of
Taoist teachings it means ‘the way followed’. So there is also a temporal
factor to it. The word also has an active aspect, for example in the sense
of ‘go one’s way’. This leads to a further variant of Tao: the behavior peculiar
to each being. This form of Tao in turn connected with the Tao which
permeates everything, indeed forms a symbiosis. Tao is then the unitive
principle of the whole cosmos. Tao is peculiar to each being and is at the same
time Being. The teaching of Tao is the basis for all religions and all
philosophical and ethical trends or systems in ancient China. Its beginnings
are obscure and lie in the prehistoric unconscious. In the age of magic,
Tao was presumably the name of the god of the ways. In the I-Ching
(Book of Changes), presumably the oldest book to have come down to us
complete (6 th or 7 th century BC), Tao teaching is alive: behind change
stands the immutable, imperishable Tao. Confucius also began from Tao
in his ethical system. For him Tao is the principle of world order. Taoism is
primarily based on Tao teaching. In Western terminology Tao becomes a
metaphysical concept. Lao-tzu especially sees Tao as a designation or,
better an indication of the nameless origin of all beings. The most
important Taoist book is by Lao-tzu, the ‘Tao-te Ching,’ a book of comparable
significance to the Bible; it may indeed be the most widely disseminated book
of world literature after the Bible. It is said to have been written by Lao-tzu.
More recent scholarship assumes that the ‘Tao-te Ching’ was compiled
around 300 BC from probably very much older texts. Lieh-tzu can say of
Tao: “It has no knowledge and can do nothing and yet it is all-knowing
and almighty. And again Chuang-tzu: “Tao does not act and no form. One
can hand it on without any other being able to receive it. One can
understand it without being able to see it. It is its own root and has existed
for ever, even before the creation of heaven and earth. Although it exists
above the highest peak of the universe it is not high. Lying this side of
211
the six ends of the universe it is not deep. Born before heaven and earth,
it has no duration. Older than the oldest antiquity, it is nevertheless not
old.”
These few texts already show that despite all the personal features
which are peculiar to Tao, it cannot be compared with the notions of God
in the monotheistic religions. The attempts of the Taoists to explain Tao
are free of any anthromorphism. We can also with good reason reject the
view of some earlier researchers into or interpreters of Taoism, that Tao
can be compared with the personal God of Christianity or neighboring
religions. For unlike the philosophers of Greece who recognized the
divine as eternal being, for the Taoists Tao did not transcend the world.
Everything is ultimately connected with the Tao, issues from it and flows
back to it. Everything not only partakes of the divine but also bears its
character. In the first chapter of the ‘Tao-te Ching,’ in which he attempts
to circle around Tao, Lao-tzu speaks of the ‘primal mother of countless
things’ which Tao embodies. Lao-tzu depicts a bipolarity of Tao which is
contrary to monotheism. This bi-polarity is not just the male-female
opposition. The God of the monotheistic religions is a ‘positive God’: his
‘properties’ are exclusively positive, so in the monotheistic religions evil
remains an even greater mystery than God himself. By contrast, in the
Tao-te Ching we have the enigmatic and provocative statement: “The
Tao, preserver of all things, is treasure to the good, protection of evil.” The
Taoists characterize Tao, among other things, with the following two
statements. Tao moves to and fro, keeps returning into itself, into the
origin. And, Tao is weak and simple like a small child or like the raw materials
of nature. Non-being, or the state which ‘precedes’ being often
preoccupied the Taoists. Thus for example we read in Chuang-tzu: “If
there is a beginning there is also a time when this beginning was not yet. If
there is being, then non-being precedes it, and this non-being is preceded by
a time, since even non-being had not yet begun.” The Taoist philosopher
Wen-tzu was also deeply preoccupied with the question of the nonbeing of Tao: “ Tao forms and shapes all things without ever being
corporeal. It is still and motionless, but it penetrates the chaos and the
dark… Even if one divides it into its smallest particle, one still does not
get within it.
In all religions of West Asian origin the question of the ultimate ground
of all being, of ‘God’, is closely connected with that of the beginning of
the world and the origin of creation. Now it is striking that ‘the problem of
a possible ‘creation’ hardly plays any role in Chinese thought.’ After all
212
that has been said about Tao so far, a Western reader may perhaps wonder
about the relationship between Tao and God. Certainly I have already
pointed out that Tao cannot be compared with the ideas of God in the
monotheistic religions. It is occasionally claimed that the ancient Chinese
had an ‘equivalent’ of God in the term ‘Ti’, and sometimes an analogy is
drawn between Tao and Ti on the one hand and deitas (divinity) and
deus (God) on the other. Ti was and is often translated ‘God’ in Western
editions of the Tao-te Ching to the present day. So, Tao cannot be
compared with Ti. And that Lao-tzu speaks both only serves to describe
the magnitude of Tao: “Before Ti was, Tao was.” That should not exclude
the possibility that Tao is also the philosophical and theological reflection
of Ti, for example along the lines of the philosophical and theological
reflection of mediaeval Western thinkers which is evident in the two
terms God-divinity (Deus-deitas). After many years of studying Tao one
will necessarily arrive at not so much the knowledge as the feeling that
one can only have an inkling of Tao. To achieve this one also has to abandon
the Western attitude, orientated as it is on knowledge. Zen is the best
mediator of this attitude, having its origin in Chinese Chan Buddhism,
which in turn represents a synthesis or symbiosis of Taoist and Buddhist
thought. Anyone who goes in search of Tao must give up any idea of wanting
to get knowledge about Tao. Accordingly, in East Asia no attempt is made.
For example, to depict Tao in art, even symbolically since there are
subjective intimations of Tao which can only be objectified by way of a
beginning and are thus they are communicable. Certainly there is what is
occasionally called ‘didactic Taoism’: for example, attempts at art
including the making of gardens, sitting in silence or engaging in
meditative movement (Tai-chi, etc) through which one can become open
to Tao. Tao is invisible and, still, indeed it is even, ‘tasteless’. Lao-tzu perhaps
gives the briefest clarification of the difference between the West Asian
concept of God and Tao: “Tao never wants to be master of things, so one
may call it great. Because it does not measure its own greatness, it can be
great.”
Face of the Only One in Monotheistic Religions
With two billion and more people, Christianity commands the largest
faithful in the world, by all means its influence is almost unmistakably felt
in every civilization in the west, makes it absolutely remarkable. I confess
to being a natively optimistic person. As I look at some of the recent
developments in the church, I see grounds for disappointment and some
discouragement, for there are those in the church who would like to
213
reverse the direction and forces set in motion by Vatican II. There are
many who have dropped out of the church, especially younger people,
who have been disillusioned with things like poorly celebrated liturgies
and frightfully uninspired preaching, the failure to include women fully
in church life or what appears to be a clerical preoccupation with sexual
morality. Yet beyond this I see other positive signs which indicate that the
church has entered a brand new epoch. The growing spiritual and
theological sensitivity on the part of catholic thinkers and missionaries
toward the other world religions, the vibrancy of African church and its
theology, and the slow but steady inclusion of the experience and
concerns of women in the life of the church and in theological reflection,
these are wonderfully welcome developments. Many Catholics have
made a breakthrough into a splendidly rich consciousness of being
Christian and being church. The faith and the church have become freshly
their own. They have realized, to a degree that counts, the historical
relativity of human institutions (especially religious ones, like ecclesiastical
structures, laws and practices) without yielding to disrespect or disregard
for their Catholic Christian tradition. They have accepted the weakness
and sinfulness of the church without necessarily giving up on institutional
religion, for they have realized that they too, as the people of God, are
the church. They are impatient for certain changes, for a more truly
democratic church (only one imperial institution still existing on this
planet), for a more authentically evangelical church, for a church which
can lead them into a richer experience of God. They are impatient but
not reckless.
Face of Triadic Monotheism
The image of God in monotheistic religions has paradoxical features.
On the one hand they believe clearly and unconditionally in a personal
God. This God created heaven and earth, and by providence governs
the world; God has history and us human beings in his hands; at the end
of times God will prove himself to be the Lord even over evil and death.
Christian faith shares this view unconditionally and without qualification
with Judaism and Islam. On the other hand Christianity has the image of a
threefold God. As is well known, this does not mean a belief in three
Gods. But we Christians believe in a God “in three persons”, to use the
terminology laid down in all the mainstream Christian churches. So there
are three persons in one God; God is three in an undiminished sense. At
the same time all three persons are the one God; so these three are one in
214
an undiminished sense. This doctrine has always been described as an
impenetrable mystery; even the numbers ‘one’ and ‘three’ are to be
understood only in an analogous sense. But no final reconciliation of the
statements has ever been achieved. According to the classical doctrine
of the Trinity God is threefold and triune, depending on where the
emphasis is placed.
1. Paradoxical and Unsatisfactory – All down the centuries the doctrine of
“One God in three persons” has remained a paradoxical and unsatisfactory
definition. It remains paradoxical, since divine unity and personal trinity
from a tension which has never been clarified rationally without remainder
and therefore has constantly led to misunderstandings. The contrast
between unity and trinity has always been a thorn in the flesh of the
understanding. At the same time the definition has remained
unsatisfactory; for while many impressive explanations were given in
scripture and early tradition, they were never completely convincing.
Belief in the triune God cannot be understood in terms of its biblical
origins without any break. Certainly there was a talk of a fundamental
triad at a very early stage. The metaphors of God’s son and spirit are
deeply rooted in the biblical tradition. The baptismal command in Mathew
speaks of ‘Father’, ‘Son’, and ‘Holy Spirit’ (Matt. 28:19). Paul ends a letter to
Corinth with a tripartite formula. “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and
the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all” (II
Cor. 13:13). And finally Father, Son and Spirit from the central principle of
division in the Apostles’ Creed: “I believe in God the Father almighty; I believe
in Jesus Christ; I believe in the Holy Spirit.” These three are always mentioned
alongside or after one another. But there is no reflection whatsoever on
the fact that they are all divine, nor on their unity of substance in a more
precise philosophical way, nor on a concept of threeness within the
Godhead. On the contrary, in the New Testament ‘God’ (theos) always
means, clearly and without any hint of differentiations within the Godhead,
the one God who will tolerate no other gods alongside him. Jesus called
him ‘Abba’, ‘Father’, and Christians may confidently call him ‘Abba’ (Mark
14:36). So to begin with there is no trace of a doctrine of the Trinity. The
new development began only when Christian faith gradually lost its
Jewish context and became part of Hellenistic culture, i.e. Hellenistic
thought and Hellenistic piety. The decisive connecting link ran through
the great turning point in Christology which became the great catalyst
of Trinitarian thought.
215
Dimensions of the Divine
If Christian faith is realized as trust, as an experience of freedom and
discipleship, in other words if we encounter God not only in the beyond
but also in ourselves and in history, then God cannot be grasped only in
the image of the person in the beyond. Driven by this question, the
Christian tradition has developed three basic symbols for God: the Spirit,
Father and the Incarnate Word. Each of these three basic symbols offers
a basic orientation for our discussion of the divine.
1. The Spirit – We begin the basic symbol ‘spirit’. Spirit here is not
understood in the a-materialistic sense of classical metaphysics, but as
the breadth of the divine which cannot be grasped and yet which
enlivens all things, what John Hick calls the ‘Inspirer’. It points to a basic
religious experience which forms an intense bond between all religions: the
divine of which, we can only have an inkling but which, sinks into human
hearts in all parts of this world and in the world as a whole. The same breadth
is found in all the organisms starting from one cell to all the way to humans,
as they all depend on inhaling and exhaling of oxygen. The presence of the
breadth of the divine is common to the past and the future. This immanent
spirit expresses itself as comprehensive present. Religious people experience
the presence of this holiness; they sink into it and thus encounter the
limits of everything and nothing, of being and passing away. Depending
on the religious context, the interpretation of this spirit is broad and open.
It speaks in the monotheistic traditions of communion and love. It extends
from an ecstatic affirmation of this world to its consistent relativization,
from a quest for present salvation to a quenching into nothingness. Anyone
who enters into the ground of reality arrives at a comprehension which
cannot be grasped. So ‘Spirit’ means the divine in its inexpressible nature,
its presence and its absolute withdrawal. Respect for this spirit leads to
negative theologies, but also to a superfluity of discourse, since all the
words in the world cannot grasp this experience.
2. The Father – Like ‘almighty’, ‘all merciful’ or ‘Lord’, ‘Father’ is only one of
the possible symbols for the possibility of addressing a Divine Personality.
This ‘Father” points to a basic dimension of the divine which has become
a primary factor in the prophetic religions. Of course as soon as Jesus
ceases to provide the context, the address ‘Father ’ can become a
restrictive and androcentric metaphor. But that is not the decisive factor.
What is decisive, rather, is that here the divine is experienced as something
over against, as an authority from the beyond, to which we can relate as
216
persons, which knows us, accepts us and loves us. This second basic
metaphor characterizes the prophetic religions: they all call on God in
unconditional trust as the one creator of heaven and earth. This “Divine
Personality” expresses itself as universal and transcendent oneness. So,
whereas the divine is immersed in the world, ‘God’ at the same time
stands over the world. God confirms the world, since as an independent
reality the world is distinct from God. In the face of the “Divine Personality”
the all-important decisive answer is not silence but a thoughtful
confession. Therefore the prophetic religions have always seen to it that
God is addressed and spoken of. God as the inexpressible “You” stands
for a controlled picture of the world, for the way from chaos to order,
from oppression to justice, from the laborious journey to the final goal.
The interpretations of this basic movement, too, can be manifold and are
to be included in the dialogue with the religions; for talk of ‘God’ and
addressing God, questions of human freedom and the shaping of a human
future, are not alien to them. Love, forgiveness and unconditional
affirmation also have everything to do with the divine.
3. The Incarnate Word – The third basic metaphor is the most difficult to fit
into inter-religious dialogue. It is ‘Incarnate Word’ and means a God and
addressing God or a divine element which has entered into human history
and taken human form. But in Christianity doesn’t this mean Jesus of
Nazareth? And mustn’t this divine status of Jesus in particular lead to a
contradiction of all other religions? Is it legitimate for a concrete historical
person to enter into the basic symbolism of God and thus break through
the distinction between God and human beings? At this precise point
everything depends on a distinction being made between the earliest
Christian triadic impulses and the later doctrine of the Trinity. Dialogue
with other religions should not begin with the question of what Jesus Christ
means for us Christians. It must begin with the question whether the ‘divine’
does not encounter us in a special way in certain historical figures? Can’t it
be the divine wisdom which according to biblical tradition dwells among
us children of men? (Prov. 8:22-31) Can’t it be God’s word which has
taken the flesh of history in many places (John 1:1)? Isn’t it there in the
historical concrete revelations which are also active in other religions?
So ‘Word’, ‘Wisdom’ and ‘Revelation’ denote those concrete memories
(words, actions, writings) in which the divine dwells among us in concrete
histories, in victory and defeat. Each of these historically tangible histories
is nothing in itself, is just a chance product of history. But at the same time
it is possible for the divine to be given in them in a particular way;
otherwise the divine cannot develop any historical force.
217
Face of a New Epoch
Christianity, with two billion adherents worldwide, is the largest, the
fastest growing, most dispersed and most fragmented world religion.
There are estimated to be 34,000 denominational groupings that share
the same fundamental articles of Christian faith but exhibit greatly
differing patterns of belief and practice. In the face of this enormous
plurality it is as though we have not just one religion, but multiple
Christianities and (with the exception of the growth of Protestant megachurch congregations) the global trend is directed towards the
proliferation of diverse and localized varieties of Christianity, as opposed
to ecclesial consolidation and convergence. The question, inevitably, is
how these many and varied expressions of Christianity relate to the one
church of Christ. In the face of such diversity, talk of future Christian unity
appears absurd to many sociologists of religion. Yet this remains the
aspiration of the ecumenical movement throughout the mainstream
churches. How realistic is such a goal? Are aspirations for Christian unity
viable or even desirable in this postmodern era of pluralism, celebration
of difference and live-and-let-live laissez faire? Some dismiss ecumenism
as a Cinderella subject doomed to fail, on the basis that there are multiple
legitimate ways of living the Christian life; the concept of unity is therefore
otiose. Others, who would equate their own brand of Christianity with the
truth in its entirety, attack ecumenism from the opposite direction.
People have a passion for the possible. People long for a church that
is more open and less certain; a church that creates a new vision for
tomorrow from yesterday’s triumphs. The Holy Spirit will not be controlled.
There is an untouchable part of all of us that senses this with knowledge
beyond knowing. It is a universal life-instinct. And it must be free. Since
the Second Vatican Council, announced by Pope John XXIII 50 years ago,
people are still waiting for signs of a more human, repentant spiritual and
ecumenical church. This will take much courage and contemplation. You
cannot discover and explore new lands without losing sight of the familiar
shoreline for a while. And the compass to negotiate these lands is already
secure in the hearts of God’s people. It is their spiritual instinct to be
faithful to an inner truth. There is a dogged loyalty. This ‘return to the laity’
encouraged by the Council is long overdue: not as helpers but as true and
powerful leaders at all levels. The gift of prophecy is alive in the priesthood
of the baptized. The Holy Spirit in their hearts and minds is ready with
undreamed of possibility. People have not given up on God, or in the
218
spiritual reality of their own lives. What people are giving up on is going
to church. It is in the institution, not God, that they are losing faith. They
wait for a call. The call is to transcendence, to a new birth, to people’s own
deepest and most original potentialities. There is much talk today of the
‘emerging church’. It is claimed to be the beginning of a new kind of
reformation. Holy Spirit must be guiding the course of humanity. Holy
Spirit will not be controlled, and blows where it wills. Jesus was clearly
concerned about the healing and transformation of real persons and
human society on Earth, and not just intellectual belief in doctrines and
moral stances, which asks almost nothing of us in terms of real inner
change.
Among many other essential characteristics of this emergent church,
we name the following: a new global sense of Christianity that can re-assess
denominational divisions, a deepening theology of non-violence, a radical
critique of systems of power, a recognition of the new structures of the faith
community, including recovery groups, study groups, contemplative groups,
mission groups for the poor and alienated; most of these springing from lay
commitment rather than from top-down ordination. For hierarchy and laity
alike, the transformation begins with the opening of each one’s heart to
personal conviction. If things go wrong in the world, this is because
something is wrong with the individual, because something is wrong
with me. This alone makes the histor y, here alone do the great
transformations take place. In our most private lives we are not only the
passive witnesses of our age but also its makers. We make our own epoch.
It is the soul that must be preserved if one is to remain a credible leader.
All else might be lost; but when the soul dies, the connection to Earth, to
peoples, to animals, to mountain ranges, also dies. And your smile … can
find an answering smile in all of us, lighting our way, and brightening the
world. We ourselves are the ones we have been waiting for. The emerging
church will only happen along the way of paradox. And this way must be
negotiated in the light of compassion. Without those constants all efforts
at a renaissance are doomed. We must first love what we critique. “How
much I must criticize you my church, and yet, how much I love you!’ wrote
Carlo Carretto. ‘You have made me suffer more than anyone. I should like to
see you destroyed and yet, I need your presence. You have given me much
scandal, and yet, you alone have made me understand holiness. Never in this
world have I seen anything more compromised, more false, yet never have I
touched anything more generous or more beautiful. Countless times I have
felt like slamming the door of my soul in your face and yet, every night I prayed
that I might die in your sure arms.’
219
My Face as Catholic Priest – Year of Priests8
“No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” Jn 15:13
There is nothing in this world, a priest can’t do! Other people also can
do lots of things, however, a priest armed with ordained mission, by all
means can surpass any normal human attempts. His life translates into
living for others, especially poor, sinners, sick and the dying. His mission
demands love, even to his enemies. His face (also my face) is always
turned toward the people those who are in danger, ever ready to lay
down his own life for others, if it is necessary. His act of sacrifice could be
a source of salvation for others. In fact, to tell you the least: every priest is a
hero! Absolutely, I am so proud to be a part of this great religious system,
where one could sense intimately the alluring addiction to renunciation
and sacrifice. Sacrifice generates unlimited power at the service of
humanity. This power is never used for selfish reasons, to defeat an enemy,
to punish an opponent or to win an argument. Sacrifice is selfless, seeks
to lighten the burdens of others, relieving their aching shoulders and
wipe away their tears. Sacrifice is anything offered to God, and the
priesthood is the most pleasing one. The expression of ultimate
renunciation could culminate in laying down one’s own life for others.
Priesthood creates, definitely an opportunity for the impossible, love without
recompense, forgiveness without reason, sacrifice without remuneration
and ministry without counting the cost. Remember the sacrifice made
by a Polish Franciscan priest Maximilian Kolbe, who was killed at the Nazi
death camp in Auschwitz, who volunteered to take the place of a young
father condemned to execution (1941). There is indeed a thrill, in dying for
others and it is in religious priesthood, you push it to the most extreme. Priests
also live with stress through friction with laypeople and “a lack of
cooperation and understanding among fellow priests and their bishops.
I think it’s a part of our job description. Jesus warns his disciples before
sending them on a mission, “everyone will hate you on account of me.”
Have you ever wondered, what goes behind the mindset of a priest?
Priesthood is the office or function of a priest.
The modern word “priest” (in French prêtre and in German priester)
is used of a person of the clergy in Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican
and Episcopalian churches. It is also used in the description of the whole
universal church as “a royal priesthood” (1 Peter 2:9). The high priesthood
8
From June of 2009 to the June of 2010, Roman Catholic Church has announced it
as “The Year of Priesthood.”
220
of Christ may be defined as his complete dedication and obedience to
God, his Father, and unlimited compassion for his fellow human beings.
At the center is his sacrificial death on the cross. On this basis and in union
with him, the priesthood of Christians is their sacrificial obedience to
God. This involves spiritual worship and love of God and compassionate
activity and prayer for their fellow human beings. Paul wrote, “Present
your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is
your spiritual worship” (Romans 12:1). Catholic priest is one who performs
the basic ordained ministry in the Catholic Church. The English word
“priest” is used to translate both the Latin word “sacerdos” and the Greek
word “hiereus”, both of which suggest ritual responsibilities pertaining to
worship, an emphasis that served to express medieval post-Tridentine
Catholic associations between priesthood and Eucharist. “Priest” also
translates, and in fact derives from, the Greek “presbyteros” which means
“elder”, a term suggesting a broader range of pastoral responsibilities.
The teachings of Vatican II are basic to its teaching about ordained
priesthood: its reaffirmation of priority of the priesthood of Christ and its
teaching that the entire community of the baptized is a priestly people
sharing, by the power of the Holy Spirit, in the threefold mission of Christ
as prophet, priest, and servant of the kingdom of God. Only within the
context of these truths does one properly appreciate the role of ordained
priesthood in the Church. The council’s principal teachings on ordained
priesthood, resides in the episcopate. Through sacramental ordination,
bishops receive the office of sanctifying, teaching and governing in the
Church. The order of priests shares with the bishops in the one and same
priesthood and ministry of Christ, though it does so in its distinctive way.
In ordination, priests receive the power of the Spirit to act sacramentally
in the person (role) of Christ, the head and shepherd of the Church. The
council deliberately broadened the notion of priestly ministry: rather
than defining the priest in terms of his relationship to the Eucharist and
his power to forgive sins, priesthood is seen in terms of a threefold ministry,
that of the word, of the sacraments, and of community leadership. The
priest exercises these functions in union with the bishop and the college
of priests of which the bishop is the head. Priests are cooperators of the
Episcopal order, necessary helpers and advisers in the ministry and office
of the bishops. The ordained priesthood and the laity share through
Baptism, a common dignity, a common grace, and a common vocation to
perfection. Within that framework, the council teaches that ordained
priesthood differs essentially from the priesthood of the faithful, though
221
the two are ordered one to the other and each in its own way shares in
the one priesthood of Christ. Basic to the function of ordained priesthood
is the charge to so minister in the name of Christ to the entire body of the
faithful that the entire Church sees itself and acts as a prophetic people,
a priestly people, servants of the kingdom of God.
In 2009, Pope Benedict declared this year as a Year of priests! For
many parishioners, God remains a punitive figure, chalking up sins to be
punished. Here, I as a parish priest, describe how my discovery of a
simpler theology of nature and grace, with God grounded in the
ordinariness of people’s lives, transformed my mission. The cherry tree
was asked ‘Speak to us of God,’ and the cherry tree blossomed! My life as
a priest was transformed when I began to believe that God was a lover
with a passion for the healing and blossoming of all people, of all creation.
After 30 years of clerical ministry I began to realize that what people
were yearning for, much more than information about the church and its
doctrines, was the actual redeeming reassurance of God in their daily lives.
They wanted the experience of God more than knowledge about him. They
longed for, in the here and now, light in their darkness, hope in their despair,
and courage in their fear. This insight into the true meaning of Incarnation
became the motivating driving force of my ministry. It was the touch of
the real presence of God in their lived lives that people wanted to feel.
To be told each Sunday about the utter holiness of their families was the
good news that they waited to hear. They so sorely needed to be reassured
that they are extravagantly and unconditionally loved by a most beautiful
God. The rediscovery of this orthodox (but mostly forgotten) theology of
nature and grace transformed my consciousness of the mystery of the
Incarnation, of the humanizing of God. The whole enterprise and privilege
of being a priest took on a radically new meaning. My work was less
about routine maintenance and more about the enrichment of each one’s,
creativity and sense of self: less about playing a clerical role in an
institutional church and more about human compassion and service.
It takes him for the bleak picture of a God who punishes, and
remembers sins, to be transformed into a God who delights in being one
of us. ‘God is sheer joy’, wrote St. Thomas Aquinas, and sheer joy ‘demands
company.’ This astonishing revelation throws up huge challenges for those
familiar only with radically misunderstood theology of fall and
redemption. Sin or no sin, it was always God’s passionate desire to become
just like us. As a priest, I saw myself as a kind of midwife, a midwife of the
222
sacredness already within the parishioners in the ordinances of their days,
in the routines of their relationships, in the high and low points of their
precious days. Everything about them was grace-filled, when they
encouraged each other, when they loved each other. This was God in action.
I was the prism to help them perceive this, to see this true colors uniquely
shining from the weekdays of their lives. Alive within our churches there is
still a deadly and deep-seated dualism dividing the holy from the human.
Even though that dichotomy was definitely ended the night that God
became human, the body of the church is still infected with the
debilitating virus. The sacraments we celebrate in our parishes are
celebrations of the holiness already within our lives: in the joy of a new
birth, in the pain of our darkness, in the holiness of human love, in the
desires of our hearts, in reconciliation with the wider community, in the
dream of the Earth. All of this led to a shift in the way that church
communities evolved. It is all about calling out the inner gifts of everyone,
the encouraging of people to see themselves as made in God’s image. We are
God’s delight. It is about helping people understand that the inner
conversion of their hearts was what Jesus was after, not just the improved
religious observation or increased church attendance that we often
mistake for inner transformation.
For myself this perspective makes me feel a priest now more than
ever before. I have felt called to help parishioners to look at life with the
sacramental vision, a way of seeing that recognizes God’s face in every
face, a God who comes to us disguised as life from ant to blue whale. It
has been written on their hearts from the very beginning. This vision of
God’s reign among us has increased our sensitivity to issues of justice
everywhere, to the care of the Earth, to engage with the destruction and
exploitation caused by human greed. In a pluralist world that is moving so
swiftly, with its powerful drives for good and evil, its sounds of glory and
cries of despair, an incarnational faith based on the goodness of creation,
and of each human being, is truly timely. Parishioners can then be filled
with a sense of their own responsibility for healing brokenness, within
their communities and in the world. As I came to realize all this as a parish
priest, pastoral ministries became collaborative. With minds, hearts and
bodies we studied, worked and prayed. The inner journey preceded the
outer one. We were often inspired by these words of Pope John Paul II:
“What the world needs now are heralds of the Gospel, who are experts in
humanity, familiar with their own emotions, able to share them with others,
and who are, at the same time, contemplatives who have fallen in love with
223
God.” Around this time I also began to realize that whatever we mean by
‘the faith’ is caught, not just taught. And I myself had to be transformed
before others would be. Only to the extent that I had explored the inner
complexity of my own heart: would I ever be any use to the people I
served? I had to learn how to know myself well because it was myself,
with my light and shadow, my sins and graces, my pretence and my
authenticity, that came across in my preaching, my serving, my leadership.
And my journey continues. My life is now devoted to deepening the
awareness of this sacramental vision, this spirituality of the heart, not only
for the personal transformation of people’s lives, but in the ministries of
education, catechesis and preaching. At this point of my life, my ministry
lies in speaking and writing on such vibrant issues.
Face of Religious Celibacy in Human Evolution
Year of Priests, forces me, leaving me with no choice, to think critically
on the vow of religious celibacy. Religious celibacy is a very old concept
and it was practiced by Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. It is Roman
Catholic Church who popularized the understanding of religious celibacy
in more organized way. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, celibacy
is the practice of perfect continence by priests and bishops meant to
foster single-minded devotion to God according to the longstanding
discipline of the Latin Church. In essence, celibacy forbids marriage by
priests and bishops and normally excludes married men from ordination.
Modern scholars trace the beginnings of celibacy to the apostolic Church
itself. As early as 390 AD the Council of Carthage noted that “It was fitting
that those who were at the service of the divine sacraments be perfectly
continent.” While it is true that Jesus called people like Peter from married
life, tradition confirms that peter did not live that state of life later: Apostle
John was also unmarried. From the fourth century Bishops were chosen
only from the unmarried clergy. Celibacy only became mandatory for
priests in 1139 when Pope Gregory VII promulgated it at the Second
Lateran Council. Once one has chosen to become a priest, he agrees to
abide by the laws of the Church, as is the case with any other society,
club, or organization. On average, it takes anywhere between 10 and 15
years to qualify for ordination during which period the candidate is
prepared academically, theologically, philosophically, spiritually, but,
unfortunately no training in celibacy.
The Church’s attraction to celibacy is founded on four obvious
principles. First, a priest is a model of Christ on Earth and acts in “persona
224
Christi”, i.e. in the person of Christ. A true and holy priest seeks to imitate
Christ in every way, including Christ’s personality and way of life. Contrary
to the popular and dominant culture of his time, Christ chose to remain
celibate. Second, celibacy demonstrates the total and exclusive
dedication of the priest to Christ’s service. He is ‘married’ to the Church.
While a good husband’s first duty is to his wife, a priest’s first duty and
concrete dedication is to his flock. Third, celibacy enables the priest to
wholly and solely focus his attention on matters of God without any earthly
distractions which might compete with God for attention. Celibacy
provides the priest with greater freedom and flexibility to attend to his
pastoral duties without the cares of family life. Lastly, celibacy is a
voluntary sacrifice made by a priest to God. By dying to himself and
giving up legitimate love of family for the sake of God, the priest gives to
God what is probably the most precious gift man is endowed with. There
are many good Catholic priests who are convinced of the value of the
precious gift of celibacy and live their vocation with conviction and joy.
They should be encouraged to continue doing so because their celibate
life is the single most precious gift which they have given to God and
the day it loses value, the church will have lost a great treasure.
Why live celibately? Attempts to answer that question are rarely
satisfactory. The traditional reasons brought forward do not seem
compelling. Lots of questions haunt some celibates most of their lives.
They simply wonder occasionally why they have chosen and continue
to choose a style of life which foregoes experiences which most men
and women consider impossible to do without and which never cease to
be attractive. The question poignantly presents itself to celibates from
time to time when they meet married people who appear to have
combined the appealing human fulfillment of marriage with zeal and
service for which the celibates renounced the attractions and satisfactions
of marriage! Considering celibacy as unnatural may be a cultural
phenomenon. Religious celibacy may be a generally acceptable,
comfortable, and gratifying style of life for some people. They need not
be defensive about it any more than married people are defensive about
marriage. Still, celibate life involves some struggle. If celibacy is not
unnatural, it is unusual. By choice celibates forgo the usual way of
developing their human potential and meeting human needs, and
therefore they encounter difficulties entailing varying degrees of
struggle, depending on the personalities involved. We may say that the
reason why a particular person chooses religious celibacy is that he or
225
she feels comfortable in that way of life, even though it may entail
hardships. Celibacy, then, is a gift before it is a choice or commitment. Religious
celibacy as we understand it here is more than a choice of celibate life for
religious reasons. It involves a promise or a vow to abide by that choice,
even for a lifetime. But who can know himself or herself and his or her
future well enough to make such a commitment? A pledge to a lifetime of
celibacy moreover is a suicide or a surrender of freedom. Not only it close off
other choices for other avenues in life, but it possibly condemns one to
suffering and unhappiness. A vow of lifelong celibacy is not a prophecy
or prediction that one will in fact live the whole of one’s life as a celibate.
No one knows the future well enough to make any such prophecy. We
may conjecture what changes will occur in the world around us on the
basis of what is going on there now, but, history as well as our own
experiences, remind us how fallible such conjectures are. Besides, we
change over the years: our vision of life alters our values shift, our response
to surroundings differs. Though most of us change radically or totally
over the years, we know from experience that we can change enough to
make a once fulfilling situation no longer satisfying. A commitment to
lifelong celibacy, then, is not to be understood as predicting future fact.
Does not a commitment to lifelong celibacy possibly condemn a
person to unhappiness? After making a pledge of celibacy for life,
someone may discover hitherto unrecognized personal needs or new
values. The satisfaction of these needs may be incompatible with celibacy;
or life according to these new values may conflict with celibate dedication.
But the person is sentenced by his or her commitment to bear perpetual
frustration of these needs or to live by values which have ceased to have
meaning. A celibate is challenged to deal with feelings of failure,
disappointment, dissatisfaction, lack of fulfillment. While struggles with
such feelings are not unique to celibates, they do have to handle them without
the help of a loving and understanding spouse. Others, widows, single
people, sometimes even the married, are of course, in the same situation.
The celibate must strive to moderate the control which he or she seeks
over genital sex. If the control is excessive, the celibate suppresses not
only the pleasures of genital sex but also sensuous pleasures remotely
but not necessarily connected to genital sex, and other kinds of pleasures
too. This range of pleasures may be legitimate and even necessary for mental
health, human dignity, and the sensitivity necessary to serve God and others
as well. The drive for genital sex is one of the most powerful forces of
nature with which human beings must deal. How can anyone renounce
226
the pleasures of sexual foreplay and orgasm which throughout human
history have been judged the most exquisitely satisfying physical
pleasure man or woman can have? How can anyone resist the frequent
vehement urges for such pleasures? The fact is that people can and do
discipline themselves to with stand those inclinations and live without
the pleasure toward which they tend. With practice, it becomes easier not
to surrender to desires and to live without the gratification of genital sex. This
ability can be gained, moreover, without adverse effects on personality.
Living celibately is not merely a matter of fighting countless battles against
insurgent physical urges or enduring privation of something whose lure
is unceasingly before the eyes of the mind. Resistance becomes an art,
an ability to divert attention from what arouses feelings and to sublimate
energies to other outlets. Greater by far than celibacy’s challenges on
the physical plane are those on the psychological. Loneliness is not unique
to the celibates, but also for widows and newly separated spouses. But
the celibate is frequently reminded that he or she is alone. The celibate
longs for more than companionship. He or she longs to be loved and to
love, indeed to be special to someone and to hold another as special. The
need to be loved, to be accepted, prized, treasured for ourselves, not
just for our work or wit or talents, begins with our existence and persists
to the end.
Another psychological need, connected with our biological nature, is
for parenthood. Most men and women desire, in varying degrees, to
generate new life, not merely biological life but human life. Nature seeks
to perpetuate itself through our persons, and we feel not only nature’s
physical push toward mating but also psychological urges to father and
to mother others. In fact, these legitimate impulses sometimes get out of
control and impede the very life they seek to promote, as when parents
dominate their children and refuse to let them grow up. The vocation to
celibacy is as complex as a person’s whole life: the choice of celibacy is
never fully explainable, even by the celibate making the choice. Not
even several reasons, much less one reason, adequately account for it.
The choice of celibacy always remains mysterious, not only to others, but to
celibates themselves. They can unearth reasons for it by reflecting on their
lives, and they may be able to pinpoint the major influences which led to
the choice, but it would take years of psychiatric analysis to comprehend
all the influences. Even with lengthy depth analysis it is doubtful that
such comprehension could be achieved. Even if it were, mystery would
still remain, for there would be the question why this person was the
227
subject of that particular confluence of forces leading to the present
choice of celibacy. Celibacy entails the very mystery of one’s own
existence. But to be aware that celibacy is a personal mysterious gift
enables one to look in the right place for an answer when seeking to
determine whether or not one should be a religious celibate. The answer
is not going to come in the shape of fully convincing reasons withstanding
debate in the public form. It is going to come from self-awareness and sensitive
perception of one’s own deepest, enduring inclinations and attractions. It is,
moreover, not going to remove all uncertainty and all risk taking. We
never fathom the depths of our own selves. The choice of celibacy will
always entail hope in God or hope in a higher purpose. Awareness of
celibacy as a personal mysterious gift also makes it possible to lead
people by appropriate means to adopt the celibate way of life. Those
means are not reasons or arguments for celibacy but attractive celibate
lives and the testimony of those who live them. So much more effort is
invested in attempting to justify celibacy than in legitimizing marriage
because religious celibacy is an unnatural way of life, though not unnatural.
The number of religious celibates in the world population is not immense,
and in some cultures none exist. Celibates as an unusual species are bound
to raise people’s curiosity and to provoke the question of why their
celibacy? Even celibates, conscious of following an unusual path, ask
themselves the question. Attempts are made to answer the questions,
not by the testimony of personal histories and careful listening to what is
said, but by explanation and understanding, that is, by reasons for
celibacy. But because of the nature of celibacy as the outcome of a
mysterious complex of influences over a lifetime, the reasons offered
never appear satisfying to speaker or audience. So, other reasons are
proposed, only to be found confusing and misleading. Thus celibacy is
forever being justified.
From early times, some people have felt the desire to dedicate
themselves entirely to the religious concerns in a celibate way of life. As
we have seen earlier, celibacy is a gift before it is a commitment and the
fulfillment of that commitment. Celibacy issues from multiple factors
influencing one’s personal history, culminating in a desire or at least a
willingness to promise celibacy and live it. In faith we see this personal
history as an enabling invitation from God. A commitment to celibacy
and fulfillment of that pledge are, therefore, responses to God inviting a
person to a way of life that, in its distinctive way, is for him, that is, for God.
Thus celibacy is not merely personal, that is, a person’s free decision
228
determining his or her personal dignity. The decision to live celibately
ultimately does not arise solely out of a person’s own resources; and
fidelity to that decision is not simply faithfulness to one’s self. Celibacy is
also and importantly interpersonal, a person’s response to a personal God,
that is, a God who knows and cares about him or her. It is a response, more
over, issuing from God’s invitation inherent in one’s personal history
enabling the response. Bible is obsessed with the proliferation of the
human species; plenty of references from the Old Testament could be
given: “I’ll make you like stars in the sky and I’ll make you like the sand on
the seashore.” Hindu religion is also obsessed in the same way. In fact
scientific definition of “living being” is marked by three important
functions: consumption, reproduction and adaptation, excluding the
celibates from the definition. Celibates don’t do reproduction of their
own species. Recent research in Genome analysis, points out that celibacy
plays a negative role in the process of natural selection. Genes themselves
are constantly being modified through a process called mutation: a change
in the structure of the DNA in an individual’s cells. Mutations can occur
during replication, the process in which a cell splits itself into two identical
copies known as daughter cells. Normally each daughter cell receives
an exact copy of the DNA from the parent cell. Occasionally, however,
errors occur, resulting in a change in the gene. Any alteration in the
structure of a gene results in a mutation. Mutations occur during DNA
replication when the chemical structure of genes undergoes random
modifications. Once a change has occurred, the altered genes continue
to replicate in their changed form unless another mutation occurs.
Sometimes mutations occur during transcription or translation, causing
protein synthesis to go awry. Although mutations may occur in any living
cell, they are most important when they occur in gametes because then the
change affects the traits of following generations. Some mutations may be
neutral or silent and do not affect the function of a protein.
Occasionally a mutation benefits an organism. Over the course of
evolutionary time, however, mutations are a driving force behind genetic
diversity and the rise of new or more competitive species better able to adapt
to changes, such as climate variations, depletion of food sources, or the
emergence of new types of disease. Mutations can produce a change in
any region of a DNA molecule. In a point mutation for example, a single
nucleotide replaces another nucleotide. Although a point mutation
produces a small change to the DNA sequence, it may cause a change in
the amino acid sequence, and thus the function, of a protein. Some
229
mutations are caused by transposition, in which long stretches of DNA
(containing one or more genes) move from one chromosome to another.
These jumping genes, called transposons, can disrupt transcription and
change the type of amino acids inserted into a protein. Transposons
rearrange and interrupt genes in a way that generally improves the genetic
variation of a species. All these valuable changes should be passed on to the
next generation that through sex. These mutations occur perhaps, on the
demand of natural selection, which has a say in: which and what type of
organism should come next in the chain of evolution? This way, the species
could increase its chance of survival in a hostile environment (may be 95
degrees Celsius in the future). If they are not passed, they are lost to the planet
for ever, resulting in the extinction of species thereby reducing the species’
chance of survival. Holy Books and religious teachings were very consistent
in promoting the importance of passing the genes to the next generation, in
Hinduism it is seen as a religious duty. In short, the genes that could save our
species in the future are perhaps locked up in the religious celibates!
Face of Hope in New Age - Believing without Belonging
Life today is often considered to have little space for religion. But
many people do seem to yearn for meaning in their life, and claim to be
spiritual. There is a high demand and a revival of interest in Christian
mystical writers, including St. Ignatius and his spiritual exercises. Over
the past decade, surveys in the West have found that growing numbers
of people say they are ‘spiritual but not religious.’ The meaning usually
derived from the phrase is that such individuals have a personal belief
system but choose not to be the part of a church or other organized
religious group. The sociologist Grace Davie hinted at the same focus on
spirituality rather than membership of religious organizations with her
phrase “Believing without Belonging” used in her analysis of religion in
Britain since 1945. “Spirituality” is a notoriously difficult word to define. The
concise Oxford English Dictionary describes it as “relating to religion or
religious belief.” Certainly it encompasses belief in God or an unidentified
higher power of life force. But it is also associated with a search for meaning
and transcendence, and a sense of connectedness with others. There are
various definitions of spirituality but today spirituality has a social
dimension so that while a belief system may be private it affects positively
how people treat one another and their environment. Secular spirituality
had grown as the churches declined.
230
Postmodern spirituality was often constructive and recognized the
interconnectedness of all things and was open to the mystical. It had too
readily been identified with atheism whereas its approach was more
usually holistic and underpinned by support for human rights,
psychology, ecology and social justice. Mystical spirituality could take
many forms and was often orientated towards the natural world rather than
something beyond. Contemplating nature or even giving birth could
trigger a religious experience. Secular spirituality at its best was an
expression of the twenty-first-century search for meaning. Postmodern
spirituality enters fully into secular spirituality. The rejection of
institutionalized religion does not lead to selfish and meaningless way of life.
Perhaps, the trend away from the institutionalized spiritualities had been
encouraged by the poor teachings on the theology of incarnation and
redemption; sin and punishment which, if done properly encourages
people to perceive the divine through the material world. An important
and urgent task is to develop an inclusive language of spirituality to
encompass all faiths and also non-believers. Modern spirituality is defined
with experiencing a deep-seated sense of meaning and purpose in life,
together with a sense of belonging. It is about acceptance, integration
and wholeness.
Silence and solitude were also deemed indispensable for spiritual
growth by Anthony de Mello (1831-1987), a Jesuit priest and
psychotherapist who became well known as a writer and speaker on
spirituality in the years after the Second Vatican Council. He is known for
his writings on the spiritual exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. The Ignatian
retreat requires a rigorous examination of conscience with an almost
obsessive importance attached to self-awareness. De Mello believed that
retreat directors should concentrate on providing methods of prayer
than content. In this regard he advocated fantasy exercises in which
people would imagine themselves with Christ during events related in
the gospels. This was controversial but De Mello justified it by citing St.
Anthony of Padua and St. Theresa of Avila who used the technique. De
Mello emphasized the need for self-discipline for those undertaking the
exercises. There should be strictly fixed times for prayer; sometimes it
was best to persevere with prayer even when retreatants didn’t want to.
They had to shed ‘inordinate attachments’, the term given by De Mello to
attachments that had become disordered because they had been placed
at the center of a person’s universe. If a person’s love is centered on God
then everything else is put into perspective, making the person truly
free. De Mello held that the spiritual exercises were about falling in love
with the absolute. It can only give us serenity and peace.
231
Many today say they crave spirituality but are weary of religion. Instead
they turn to contemporary guided and gurus. But there is little being
said by these New Age writers, that cannot be found in the gospels and
in the works of the Church’s great teachers. Recently I met a couple,
Rajesh and Anita, who said they were not particularly religious but they
were well versed in the writings of popular guided and gurus such as
Deepak Chopra, Eckhart Tolle, Louis Hay, Paulo Coelho, Wayne Dyer and
other “self-help” experts. Even though enriched by their devotion to
these New Age writers and speakers, they sometimes wondered about
how really Christian those authors were? Many people’s ideas about life
were based on the belief that the world is urgently on our side, that the
human spirit has an infinite capacity, that life itself conspires to bring us
to the deepest fulfillment so that when we really and truly want something
good to happen, then by virtue of our loving desire, it will happen. They
quoted Winston Churchill’s remark that “you create your own universe as you
go along.” And no less a scholar than the American writer and mythologist
Joseph Campbell advised: “Follow your bliss and the universe will open
doors for you where there were only walls before.” Everything you send
out, they said, by way of thought or desire, negative or positive, returns
to you with a threefold increase in the same direction. The motivational
writer Louise Hay, who claimed that she cured herself of cancer,
maintained that we are responsible for the quality of our own experiences.
We choose joy or negativity, illness or health. Every thought we think is
creating our future. We all have this astonishing power. People believe
that the more we surround ourselves with light, with emotions and ideas
of peace and success, then the more surely they will happen. They call it
“The law of attraction.” The combination of thought and love forms the
irresistible force of this law. The reason that this amazing truth does not
happen more often is because people do not believe it can happen.
People quote Eckhart Tolle’s teaching about the source of so much
struggle and disillusionment in our lives. We carry a self-defeating impulse
within us. When we go against the grain of the growth of being, when we
swim against the current of life’s flow, it is then we lose our peace and
purpose. “What we resist: persists,” wrote Carl Jung. A conflict is set up by
our negative thoughts and feelings. We must focus instead on the energy
of our inner spirit. The whole world then colludes to make our dreams
come true. We can change everything they assured me, right here and
right now. To develop deeply enhanced ways of seeing and being we
only have to start thinking and imagining in a new way. All that life needs
from us is the initial confident desire for transformation. The beginning is
232
the thing. Martin Luther King said: “take the first step. You do not have to
see the whole staircase. Just take the first step.” Whatever we think about,
wish about and thank about, we bring about. “Imagination is everything,”
said Albert Einstein. “It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.”
We already find in the Gospel most of the sentiments they had
expressed. Jesus was not in competition with the wisdom of the world;
he wished only to set it against a richer, deeper background. He spoke
many times about our amazing powers to transform ourselves and others,
even to work miracles as he himself did. He guaranteed that whatever
we ask for would be granted. In fact it would be granted even before we
asked for it, so anxious is God to shower us with an abundance of blessings.
Christ put that clearly in his stories about the sound tree and the good
fruit, about the Scribes and Pharisees. Again: “Whatever we give out, we
get back.” Jesus reassured us that we get it back a hundredfold. Here,
once more, is the extravagance of unconditional loving. “Give and it will
be given to you: a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running
over, will be put into your lap” (Luke 6:38). New Age followers believe that
their futures, and that of the planet, are dependent upon what we profoundly
wish for, and visualize as already actually happening. Jesus, too, preached
about the importance of choice, the transformation of negative thinking,
so that we can experience, the inner freedom of the children of God.
“Bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you” (Luke 6:28).
Fill your mind with powerful thoughts, St Paul pleaded, with whatever is
good and uplifting. If you believe enough, you can move mountains. “I
can do all things through him who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13).
Could one say, then, that those non religious gurus were working out of the
“natural” wisdom of their hearts and minds, but unknowingly, their insights
were inspired by the grace of God? “Our human hearts are naturally religious”,
Cardinal Hume used to say. The wisdom of the Word was in the human
heart long before the birth of Jesus.
Face of Faith in Godless Societies
Of the non-Christian religions, primarily Buddhism has great
possibilities of acceptance, becoming more popular in recent times. In
it, reality is grasped in a ‘godless’ way; for there is no idea of a creator God
and personal deity, or of a theonomous ethic based on it, which is experienced
as heteronomous. While it is inappropriate to follow H. von Glasenapp in
calling Buddhism an ‘atheistic religion’, the exclusion of the topic of God
does prove an advantage in an encounter with people who come from
233
the Christian tradition and who have found questions associated with it,
including moral and psychological questions to be a burden. Another
attractive feature of Buddhism and also of Hinduism is its de facto
tolerance, which confirms the modern self-understanding deriving from
the Enlightenment. Furthermore, Buddhism shows a much smaller degree
of religious institutionalization than the Christian confessions. So it is
experienced as less of a burden and meets the need for freedom
nourished by the critique of religion. Taken together, the aspects
mentioned go a long way towards explaining why the reality of the divine
or the Absolute experienced in Eastern religions finds so great an echo in
the West, although the West is characterized by remoteness from God and
a criticism of religion. Given these religious alternatives, which are
becoming increasingly evident in a cultural sphere stamped over many
centuries by Christianity, the question becomes increasingly urgent: how
is the Christian experience of God to be preserved and shaped in an
environment remote from God? The institutionalized religions make this
remoteness much wider, with their theologies and interpretations. First of all
we must look at the specific reciprocal relationship between the modern
history of Christianity and atheism. For unlike other religions, it is only the
Christian cultural sphere which has produced such a high degree of
resolute atheism. Nowhere else is God denied so radically and
passionately, and nowhere else have there been so many people who for
various reasons have so resolutely turned away from practicing their
native religion.
1. Two Dimensions - Two dimensions, one, official religions and the other,
popular religions, need to be distinguished in the motifs and arguments
of modern anti-Christian criticism of religion. This protest fights on the
one hand against the claims to social power in the Christian confessions
and on the other against the religious ideas, especially an authoritarian
picture of God, that seem to legitimate these claims to power. So anyone
who wants to reflect on the experience of the divine appropriately in
this situation created by the critique of religion must distinguish between
an ethical-political and an ideological-theoretical aspect. In no way can
we limit ourselves to the religious dimension, for this is most deeply
interwoven with the anthropological understanding of ethics and society.
It will only be possible to communicate the experience of the divine
reality credibly if this does not legitimate any repressive or authoritarian
relationships, with reference to the individual or society. It is also necessary
to take this politically relevant aspect into account for historical reasons:
234
the representatives of institutionalized religions have brought a great burden
upon themselves through the misuse of political power. These acts of
injustice, some of which were committed in the name of God, have often
obscured the image of the divine reality; the rise of modern atheism cannot
be understood outside this context. So anyone who wants to discuss the
experiences of the divine in a godless time must go into the two aspects
mentioned.
2. Conflict Between Institutionalized Religions and Modern Culture – The
difficulties associated with the experience of God can be solved only if
the problems which have arisen in connection with the relationship
between modern culture and religious tradition are overcome. At the
outset, all the religious communities must explicitly repudiate the
unacceptable practices of the past. Injustices must be conceded; a
confession of guilt the beginning of which were already expressed at
the Second Vatican Council over the origin of atheism (Gaudium et Spes,
nos. 20,21) is called for. But a confession of omissions and failures in the
past will be credible only if similar attitudes are ruled out in the present. Now
questions about the modern human self-understanding are also under
discussion. In particular the serious difficulties over questions of autonomy
have led to persistent alienation. It is necessary, rather, to work through
the misunderstandings and problems which have arisen in a process of
alienation lasting for centuries. Only if this proves successful can we
expect a new openness towards the religious answer of Christianity to
the question of meaning. So in their theoretical self-understanding, the
Christian confessions must reflect on those practices and forms which
they owe to a past time and culture, which are neither essentially bound
up with Christian faith nor have universally been accepted by the Christian
tradition. Some of the topics to be mentioned here are: equal rights for
women, a sense of democracy, the capacity and possibility of the religious
communities to meet individual human needs or to re-evaluate earthly
conditions. A religion which evades this task will lose its significance for the
concrete experience of present-day men and women; for if religious life does
not refer to everyday praxis, it becomes a special sphere. It is forced to the
periphery and thus becomes irrelevant. In that case the religions which
came into existence in pre-modern times become the advocates of forms
of inequality instead of contributing to the overcoming of discrimination.
The God of religion understood in this way is experienced as a God of
injustice and oppression, not as a God of life and liberation, which God in
truth is and is confessed to be.
235
3. Criticism of the Theistic Picture of God – The opening up of a mystical
experience of God, as its name already indicates, the central thrust of the
criticism made by atheism lies in its negation of the existence of God;
more specifically a theistic image of God with a Christian stamp is rejected.
A fundamental answer must be given to this criticism, since it touches
the heart of the Christian religion. On the other hand its purifying,
cleansing aspects cannot be denied. The religions of revelation need
also to reflect again on their own anthropological foundation, since it is
particularly in this sphere that the discussion with the critique of religion
has to be carried on. Given the godlessness of modernity, the question of
the natural knowledge of God must be taken up in a new form;
philosophical theology is required. Here, while the argument must be
‘rational’, a dimension must also be taken into account which transcends
rationality in the limited modern sense: the authentically religious
dimension of human experience. But how can an elemental religious sense,
be communicated in a way which can be experienced? In the context of
the present situation, namely a society which is de facto godless, mysticism
seems to be a convincing way. Accordingly, it is a central task of Christianity
once again to bring to life the mystical dimension under present conditions.
So it is important to engage the modern self-understanding in dialogue with
the insights of the great mystics. If this dialogue is carried out carefully, then
it will at any rate provide the possibility of meeting the challenges of a divine
interpretation of reality, for on the basis of such an experience the experience
of absolute reality can be newly discovered and experienced in one’s own
faith tradition. Such discoveries are of prime importance in the presentday situation of remoteness from God. It is not enough to communicate a
general and undifferentiated experience of the divine. What is under
discussion is the concrete experience of transcendent reality, i.e., an
encounter with God or the divine which, in general cultural and individual
biographical terms, is stamped by a specific religious tradition.
Modern Face of Religion - Revival of Religion
Two Religious Dimensions: Official Religion and Popular Religion– Today
it is clear that there is a revival of the religious and mystical dimension.
However, this has nothing to do with official religion, but is a revitalization
of the religious roots deep in the people. I suggest a distinction between
two religious dimensions: official and popular. In fact in Latin America
and India, most people practice two religions, one official or institutional
and the other popular and traditional. The distinction between two
religions or religious spheres is often accepted explicitly and consciously.
236
The Crisis of Modernity and the Revival of Religion: Concepts of Religion
– The crisis of modernity has brought with it the crisis of modern concepts
of religion. Auguste Comte thought of religion as a primitive form of
knowledge, prior to critical and scientific knowledge, and doomed to
disappear. Karl Marx defined religion as the opium of the people, and as
the heart of a heartless system: for him, religious pain was only the
expression of real pain, and religion, in his view, would disappear when
social contradictions were overcome. Sigmund Freud thought of religion
as a disease, an illusion of neurotic minds seeking to overcome fear; a
healthy mind would not need religion. Max Weber described religion as
a phenomenon destined to disappear as a result of the irreversible process
of rationalization and secularization. Maybe in the modern period religion
really was what these thinkers claimed, but the crisis of modernity also
means a crisis for a particular form of religion and the renaissance of religion
with specific characteristics. We are witnessing, a resurgence of the
religious dimensions and of the religious sense, within popular religions
which spring up alongside modern, institutionalized forms of religion.
Religion is reappearing now, not as backwardness, a drug, pain or disease,
but as sanity, protest and utopia, the source of a new energy and of a new
form of symbolic and mystical knowledge. The religion which is reemerging out of the crisis of modernity has three essential features:
1. Gratuitousness – Religion is a reaction against intellectual rationalism,
against modern instrumental reason, against the pseudo-liberating
mechanisms of science and technology, against the myth of the
efficiency of unrestricted development, against the fetishism of power,
exploitation of environment, authority, infallibility and prestige, against
the religion of the market and the morality of making the maximum
possible profit. The new religious experience, coming back now as
modernity goes into crisis, is a religion based on grace and truth, justice
and peace, opposed to the legalism and hypocrisy of the official religions;
it asserts a belief in gratuitousness in the face of calculating
bureaucracies, an awareness of being rather than the passions of
possession and power, a philosophy of poverty and sharing against
the logic of the market and profit. What we find emerging is a religion
of gratuitousness, of grace and agape or disinterested love.
2. Transcendence – The religion emerging out of the crisis of modernity is
a reaction against all perverse spiritualism that defines itself as something
beyond the body, beyond the cosmos or beyond history. It is a reaction
against those views of the spiritual that repress the body, destroy nature
237
and proclaim the end of history. The religion reviving with the crisis of
modernity is now looking for a transcendence within the domain of the
body, the cosmos and history; a transcendence that is not beyond history
but beyond the oppression within the history; a transcendence that is not
beyond the body and nature but beyond death but within the body and
nature. Transcendence is the overcoming of oppression and exploitation
and death within our history, with its human, bodily and cosmic
dimensions. This definition of transcendence is set out magisterially in
biblical texts such as Isaiah 65 and Revelation 21-22.
3. Transparency – The religion returning with the crisis of modernity is a
religion that seeks the presence of God directly in the reality of things and
people without mediation by institutions, dogmas or hierarchies. As the
rebel Job says prophetically, “I had heard of you by the hearing of the
ear, but now my eyes see you” (Job 42. 3-5). God is encountered in the
direct transparency of the cosmos, the body and the community,
beyond empirical data and the limits of tangible reality. God is in the
deep and hidden dimension of history, revealed in the transparency
and luminosity of creation, is contacted more by the heart, the
imagination, silence, activity and mystical vision than through reason
and practical definitions.
Religions Revive in the Lives of the Poor
“If you don’t find God in the next person you meet, it is a waste of time looking
for him further.” M.K. Gandhi.
“Truly I tell you, whatso ever you did to the one of those brothers, you did it
to me” Mt 25:40
So far I have looked at the distinction between official religion and
popular religion, and how popular religion is currently enjoying a vigorous
revival. I also looked at some basic features of popular religion. We now
need to look at what this means for the salvation of the lives of the poor
in the Third World or, simply, at the credibility of God as the God of life in
the Third World. The expression ‘Third World’ no longer makes sense, but
I use it for the sake of convenience. I use it to mean the poor countries
(almost all of Central and South Asia, Africa, Latin America), and the poor
in all countries, in other words, the poor and deprived 80 percent of
humanity.
1. The World of the Excluded – The reality of death growing apace in the
poor countries and among the poor of all countries is a glaring fact
today. The collapse of the historic forms of socialism in Eastern Europe
238
has been followed immediately by the collapse of the dependent
capitalisms of the South. What is now growing is a savage capitalism,
in which the richest 20% of the human race have appropriated 82% of
world income, 81% of world trade and 94% of loans; in addition they
consume 70% of world energy and 60% of food (the report of UNO on
Human Development 2002). The world is coming together into a single
free market economic system that concentrates wealth in the hands
of a minority and produces a poor and deprived majority in the Third
World, which itself is increasingly isolated, forgotten and disposable.
Two death-dealing trends are apparent in the new international ‘order’:
the destruction of nature and environment and the exclusion of the
majorities. The neo-liberal banquet is marvelous, but there are very few
guests, and the natural resources are being constantly depleted. ‘Exclusion’
is a new phenomenon added to that of the poverty and deprivation that
already exist. The excluded are those who do not fall under the logic of
the market, whose deaths do not affect the efficiency and productivity
of the system. Among the excluded there is a growth in social
disintegration, family breakdown and violence. Also on the increase are
crime, the drugs trade and the destruction of forests, other human activities
against nature and mass extinctions and mass epidemics. The Third World,
as the world of the excluded, is considered at root as a threat, as a
guilty victim that must be sacrificed, and as a world suffering
systematic aggression, for ‘humanitarian reasons’, by the Western
powers. All possible alternatives, critical theories and liberating utopias,
are coldly dismissed and destroyed. Somalia, Rwanda, Haiti and
Bangladesh are just some of the foretastes of the future, waiting in the
Third World. This situation of the death of humanity and the cosmos
raises again the question how we can believe in God as the God of life
and as the creator God. What religion can emerge as a utopia and
hope in such conditions of death?
2. Wealth in the Third World – the Third World is distinctly poor in weapons,
money and technology, but rich in humanity, culture, ethics and
spirituality. There is a wealth and identity in the Third World that is all
its own, a reserve of humanity, culture and spiritual strength that could
be the source of a hope and the basis for an alternative way of life, not
just for the Third World as a threat, and think of it as a source of hope. In
this book it is impossible to examine all the economic, social and cultural
possibilities of the Third World. All I can say is that, it has a strong moral
and spiritual force and the liberating possibilities of a revival of religion
in the world of the poor.
239
3. Is there an Alternative? – Economists and politicians claim confidently
that there is no alternative to the current global free market system.
This may be true, at least in the short term. But as theologians and
believers we insist, just as confidently, that it is possible to build an
alternative to the logic of the market: an alternative to the consumptionobsessed, individualistic and violent culture of the market, an
alternative to the market’s ethics of death, based solely on efficiency
and profit, and above all an alternative to the idolatry of the market. I
insist: I am not talking about an alternative to the market as such, but
about an alternative to the cultural, moral and spiritual culture of the
market.
We live in a free market economy, but we do not belong to the
market; we follow Jesus’ injunction to be in the world without belonging
to the world (Jn 17.14-19) and without loving the things of the world
(1 Jn. 2:15-16). The alternative is to live in the present system with a
different culture, ethics and spirituality, consistent with our faith in the
God of life. Of course, in order to be a real alternative, this must have an
economic, political and social base. There is no room here to discuss
the viability of this base, but it is a reality in the Third World. I shall
simply mention here the strength of the alternative social movements,
the new historical protagonists, popular economy and alternative
economic projects, the rebuilding of local or grass roots power, the
revitalization of civil society, etc. At this economic political base a
culture, ethics and spirituality of life is developing, an alternative to
the logic of the free market system.
4. The Importance of Religion – If the alternative to the free market system
is an alternative to the, market’s own cultural, ethical and spiritual logic,
then the importance of religion in saving the lives of the poor and
excluded in the Third World becomes clear; it is part of our identity at
the deepest level. In fact, the great written religions are almost all
Third World religions; Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc., and especially
Christianity, which originated in Galilee and today lives and grows
especially in the Third World (there are more colored Christians than
white Christians). As I said, the Third World is poor in weapons, money and
technology, but rich in humanity, culture and religion. The more the Third
World is threatened with death, the more the poor majorities are
developing all their moral and spiritual life potential to survive, resist
and build new alternatives. This explains and gives meaning to the
240
revival of religions in the Third World, and not just any religion, but a
popular religion at the heart of which there is hope, protest and utopia,
a popular, not an institutional, religion expressed in the body,
community, the cosmos and the participation of women. It is a religion
reborn out of the crisis of modernity, with a liberating dimension of
gratuitousness, transcendence and transparency. This religion enables
us to rediscover God as the God of life, opposed to all idolatry, economic,
commercial, political, technological, cultural or institutional. The return
and revival of the religion of mysticism, at a time of a crisis of civilization,
is thus a sign of hope and life; it is the response on the poor and
excluded to the crisis and what encourages us to resist and fight that
all may have life.
God Against Religions
Jesus said, “You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesized about you,
for he wrote, ‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far
from me. Their worship is a farce, for they teach man-made ideas as
commands from God’ (Mathew 15:7-9)”.
Buddha was against religion: the manipulation of religion. Jesus
denounced religion: the hierarchical part of religion. He criticized religion
several times of its practices for having a show of piety, but lacking true
heart-felt adoration of God. Gandhi understood religion as an
establishment of social control. Religion does this through a series of
moral and ethical beliefs, along with real and imagined rewards and
punishments, internalized in individuals. Religion also achieves social
control by manipulating its members for collective action. However,
although it maintains social order, religion also can promote change.
Religious movements aimed at the revitalization of society have helped
people cope with changing conditions. Religion has meaning for people.
It influences their use of various resources. It helps men and women
cope with adversity and tragedy. It offers hope that things will get better.
Lives can be transformed through spiritual healing or rebirth. Sinners can
repent and be saved, or they can go on sinning and be damned. If the
faithful truly internalize a system of religious rewards and punishments, their
religion becomes a powerful means of controlling their beliefs, their behavior,
and what they teach their children. Many people engage in religious activity
because it seems to work. Prayers get answered. Faith healers heal.
Sometimes it doesn’t take much to convince the faithful that religious
actions are efficacious. Religion can work by getting inside people and
241
mobilizing their emotions, their joys, their wrath, their righteousness. Emile
Durkheim, a prominent French social theorist and scholar of religion,
described the “collective effervescence” that can develop in religious
contexts. Intense emotion bubbles up. People feel a deep sense of shared
joy, meaning, experience, communion, belonging, and commitment to
their religion. The power of religion affects action. When religions meet,
they can coexist peacefully, or their differences can be a basis for enmity
and disharmony, even battle. Religious fervor has inspired some religions
on crusades against the infidel and has led religions to wage holy wars.
Throughout history, political leaders have used religion to promote and
justify their views and policies.
How many religious leaders mobilize communities and, in so doing,
gain support for their own policies? One way is by persuasion; another is
by instilling hatred or fear. Consider witchcraft accusations. Remember
inquisition. 9 Witch hunts can be powerful means of social control by
creating a climate of danger and insecurity that affects everyone, not
just the people who are likely targets. To ensure proper behavior, religions
offer rewards, such as the fellowship of the religious community, and
punishments, such as the threat of being cast out or excommunicated.
Many religions promise rewards for the good life and punishment for the
bad. A follower’s physical, mental, moral, and spiritual health, now and
forever, may depend on his or her beliefs and behavior. Religions,
especially the formal organized ones typically found in state societies,
often prescribe a code of ethics and morality to guide behavior. The
Judaic Ten Commandments lay down a set of prohibitions against killing,
stealing, adultery, and other misdeeds. Crimes are breaches of secular
laws, just as sins are breaches of religious strictures. Some rules proscribe
or prohibit behavior; others prescribe behavior. The Golden rule 10 for
instance, is a religious guide to do unto others as you would have them do
unto you. Moral codes are ways of maintaining order and stability. Codes of
morality and ethics are repeated constantly in religious sermons,
9
Inquisition, a judicial institution, established by the papacy in the Middle Ages,
charged with seeking out, trying, and sentencing persons guilty of heresy. Pope Paul III
in 1542 heeded reformers such as Gian Pietro Cardinal Carafa and established in Rome
the Congregation of the Inquisition, also known as the Roman Inquisition and the Holy
Office. In 1965 Pope Paul, responding to many complaints recognized the Holy Office
and renamed it the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. But in practice, Inquisition
still persists in form of mental agony like suspension and excommunication.
10
Golden Rule is a rule of conduct that advises people to treat others in the same
manner as they wish to be treated themselves.
242
catechisms, and the like. They become internalized psychologically. They
guide behavior and produce regret, guilt, shame, and the need for
forgiveness, expiation, and absolution when they are not followed.
Religions also maintain social control by stressing the temporary and fleeting
nature of this life. They promise rewards and punishments in this and after
life. Such beliefs serve to reinforce the status quo. People accept what
they have now, knowing they can expect something better in the afterlife
or the next life if they follow religious guidelines. Under slavery in the
American South, the masters taught portions of the Bible, such as the
story of Job that stressed compliance. The slaves, on the other hand,
seized on the story of Moses, and the promised and, and deliverance.
The grand denouncers of religions in our times were “The Renaissance”
and “The Reformation.” These revolts in their extreme forms tried to destroy
religion altogether, boasted indeed of having killed the religious instinct
in man, a vain and ignorant boast, as we now see, for the religious instinct
in man is most of all the one instinct in him that cannot be killed, it only
changes its form. In its more moderate movements the revolt put religion
aside into a corner of the soul by itself and banished its roots in the
intellectual, aesthetic, practical life and even in the ethical; and it did this
on the ground that the roots of religion in science, thought, politics,
society, life in general had been and must be a force for retardation,
superstition, oppressive ignorance. The religionist may say that this
accusation was an error and an atheistic perversity, or he may say that a
religious retardation, a pious ignorance, a contented static condition or
even an orderly stagnation full of holy thoughts of the beyond is much
better than a continuous endeavor after greater knowledge, greater
mastery, more happiness, joy, light upon this transient Earth. But the
Catholic thinker cannot accept such a plea, he is obliged to see that so
long as man has not realized the divine and the ideal in his life, and it may
well be even when he has realized it, since the divine is the infinite:
progress and not unmoving status is the necessary and desirable law of
his life, not indeed any breathless rush after novelties, but a constant
motion towards a greater and greater truth of the spirit, the thought and
the life not only in the individual, but in the collectivity, in the communal
endeavor, in the turn, ideals, temperament, make of the society, in its
strivings towards perfection. And he is obliged too to see that the
indictment against religion, not in its conclusion, but in its premises had
something, had even much to justify it, not that religion in itself must be,
but that historically and as a matter of fact the accredited religions and
243
their hierarchies and exponents have too often been a force for
retardation, have too often thrown their weight on the side of darkness,
oppression and ignorance, and that it has needed a denial, a revolt of the
oppressed human mind and heart to correct these errors and set religion
right. And why should this have been if religion is the true and sufficient
guide and regulator of all human activities and the whole of human life?
We need not follow the rationalistic or atheistic mind through all its
aggressive indictment of religion. We need not for instance lay a too
excessive stress on the superstitions, aberrations, violence, crimes even,
which churches and cults and creeds have favored, admitted, sanctioned,
supported or exploited for their own benefit, the mere hostile
enumeration of which might lead one to echo the cry of the atheistic
Roman poet, “To such a mass of ills could religion persuade mankind.” As
well might one cite the crimes and errors which have been committed in
the name of the liberty or the ideal of social order. But we have to note
the fact that such a thing was possible and to find its explanation. We
cannot ignore for instance the blood-stained and fiery track which formal
external Christianity has left furrowed across the mediaeval history of
Europe almost from the days of Constantine, its first hour of secular
triumph, down to very recent times, or the sanguinary comment which
such an institution as the Inquisition affords on the claim of religion to be
the directing light and regulating power in ethics and society, or religious
wars and wide spread State persecutions on its claim to guide the political
life of mankind. But we must observe the root of this evil, which is not in true
religion itself, but in its infra-rational parts, not in spiritual faith and aspiration,
but in our ignorant human confusion of religion with a particular creed, sect,
cult, religious society of church. So strong is the human tendency to this
error that even the old tolerant Paganism slew Socrates in the name of
religion and morality, feebly persecuted non-national faiths like the cult
of Isis or the cult of Mithra and more vigorously what it conceived to be
the subversive and anti-social religion of the early faithful; and even in
still more fundamentally tolerant Hinduism with all its spiritual broadness
and enlightenment it led at one time to the milder mutual hatred and
occasional though brief-lived persecution of Buddhism, Jain, Shaiva,
Vaishnava.
The whole root of the historic insufficiency of religion as a guide and
control of human society lies there. Religious creeds have, for example,
stood violently in the way of philosophy and science, burned a Giordano
244
Bruno, imprisoned a Galileo, and so generally misconducted themselves
in this matter that philosophy and science had in self defense to turn
upon religion and rend her to pieces in order to get a free field for their
legitimate development; and this because men in the passion and
darkness of their vital nature had chosen to think that religion was bound
up with certain fixed intellectual conceptions about scrutiny had to be put
down by fire and sword; scientific and philosophical truth had to be denied in
order that religious error might survive. We see too that a narrow religious
spirit often oppresses and impoverishes the joy and beauty of life, either
from an intolerant asceticism or, as the Puritans attempted it, because
they could not see that religious austerity is not the whole of religion,
though it may be an important side of it, is not the sole ethical-religious
approach to god, since love, charity, gentleness, tolerance, kindliness are
also and even more divine, and they forgot or never knew that god is love and
beauty as well as purity. In politics religion has often thrown itself on the
side of power and resisted the coming of larger political ideals, because
it was itself, in the form of a church, supported by power and because it
confused religion with the church, or because it stood for a false theocracy,
forgetting that true theocracy is the Kingdom of God in man and not the
kingdom of pontiffs, a priesthood or a sacerdotal class. So too it has often
supported a rigid and outworn social system, because it thought its own
life bound up with social forms with which it happened to have been
associated during a long portion of its own history and erroneously
concluded that even a necessary change there would be a violation of
religion and a danger to its existence. As if so mighty and inward a power
as the religious spirit in man could be destroyed by anything so small as
the change of a social form or so outward as a social readjustment! This
error in its many shapes has been the great weakness of religion as
practiced in the past and the opportunity and justification for the revolt
of the intelligence, the aesthetic sense, the social and political idealism,
even the ethical spirit of the human being against what should have its
own highest tendency and law.
Here then lies one secret of the divergence between the ancient and
the modern, the Eastern and Western ideal, and here also one clue to
their reconciliation. Both rest upon certain strong justification and their
quarrel is due to a misunderstanding. It is true in a sense that religion
should be the dominant thing in life, its light and law, but religion as it should
be and is in its inner nature, its fundamental law of being, a seeking after god,
the cult of spirituality, the opening of the deepest life of the soul to the
245
indwelling godhead, the eternal omnipresence. On the other hand, it is true
that religion when it identifies itself only with a creed, a cult, a church, a system
of ceremonial forms, may well become a retarding force and there may
therefore arises a necessity for the human spirit to reject its control over the
varied activities of life. But here comes in an ambiguity which brings in a
deeper source of divergence. For by spirituality religion seems often to
mean something remote from earthly life, different from it, hostile to it. It
seems to condemn the pursuit of earthly aims as a trend opposed to the
turn to a spiritual life and the hopes of man on earth as an illusion or a
vanity incompatible with the hope of man in heaven. The spirit then
becomes something aloof which man can only reach by throwing away
the life of his lower members. Either he must abandon this nether life
after a certain point, when it has served its purpose, or must persistently
discourage, mortify and kill it. If that be the true sense of religion, then
obviously religion has no positive message for human society in the proper
field of social effort, hope and aspiration or for the individual in any of the
lower members of his being.
For each principle of our nature seeks naturally for perfection in its
own sphere and, if it is to obey a higher power, it must be because that
power gives it a greater perfection and a fuller satisfaction even in its
own field. But if perfectibility is denied to it and therefore the aspiration
to perfection taken away by the spiritual urge, then it must either lose
faith in itself and the power to pursue the natural expansion of its energies
and activities or it must reject the call of the spirit in order to follow its
own bend and law, “dharma.” This quarrel between Earth and heaven,
between the spirit and its members becomes still more sterilizing if
spirituality takes the form of a religion of sorrow and suffering and austere
mortification and the gospel of the vanity of things; in its exaggeration it
leads to such nightmares of the soul as that terrible gloom and
hopelessness of the Middle Ages in their worst moment when the one
hope of mankind seemed to be in the approaching and expected end of
the world, an inevitable and desirable Pralaya. 11 But even in less
11
Pralaya, or laya, (Sanskrit, “dissolution”) is a term in Hindu comprehension that
conveys all appearance is subject dissolution, but not to destruction, because dissolution
leads to recreation. The term is especially used at the ending of a kalpa (cosmic cycle),
which then via pravrtti leads to a new creation. But there may be also lesser pralayas
such as the great flood of Manu, which occurred when all creation was submerged under
a deluge. However, Manu had rescued a fish that grew large, and told him to build a large
boat in which he was to take seeds and animals. Then the fish rowed the boat to safety
by anchoring it to the top of the highest Himalayas.
246
pronounced and intolerant forms of this pessimistic attitude with regard
to the world, it becomes a force for the discouragement of life and cannot,
therefore, be a true law and guide for life. All pessimism is to that extent a
denial of the Spirit, of its fullness and power, an impatience with the ways
of God in the world, an insufficient faith in the divine wisdom, and will
that created the world and for ever guide it. It admits a wrong notion
about that supreme wisdom and power and therefore cannot itself be
the supreme wisdom and power of the spirit to which the world can look
for guidance and for the uplifting of its whole life towards the divine.
The Western recoil from religion, that minimizing of its claim and
insistence by which Europe progressed from the mediaeval religious
attitude through the Renaissance and the Reformation to the modern
rationalistic attitude, that making of the ordinary earthly life our one
preoccupation, that labor to fulfill ourselves by the lower members,
divorced from all spiritual seeking, was an opposite error, the contrary
ignorant extreme, the blind swing of the pendulum from a wrong
affirmation to a wrong negation. It is an error because perfection cannot
be found in such a limitation and restriction, for it denies the complete
law of human existence, its deepest urge, and it’s most secret impulse.
Only by the light and power of the highest can the lower be perfectly
guided, uplifted and accomplished. The lower life of man is in form undivine, though in it there is the secret of the divine, and it can only be divinized
by finding the higher law and the spiritual illumination. On the other hand,
the impatience which condemns or despairs of life or discourages its growth
because it is at present un-divine and is not in harmony with the spiritual life,
is an equal ignorance, “andham tamah.” The world-shunning monk, the
mere ascetic may indeed well find by this turn his own individual and
peculiar salvation, the spiritual recompense of his renunciation and
Tapasya, as the materialist may find by his own exclusive method the
appropriate rewards of his energy and concentrated seeking; but neither
can be the true guide of mankind and its law-giver. The monastic attitude
implies a fear, an aversion, a distrust of life and its aspirations, and one
cannot wisely guide that with which one is entirely out of sympathy, that
which one wishes to minimize and discourage. The sheer ascetic spirit, if
it directed life and human society, could only prepare it to be a means
for denying itself and getting away from its own motives. An ascetic
guidance might tolerate the lower activities, but only with a view to
persuade them in the end to minimize and finally cease from their own
action. But a spirituality which draws back from life to envelop it without
being dominated by it does not labor under this disability. The spiritual
247
man who can guide human life towards its perfection is typified in the
ancient Indian idea of the Rishi, one who has lived fully the life of man
and found the word of the supra intellectual, supramental, spiritual truth.
He has risen above these lower limitations and can view all things from
above, but also he is in sympathy with their effort and can view them
from within; he has the complete inner knowledge and the higher
surpassing knowledge. Therefore he can guide the world humanly as
god guides it divinely, because like the divine he is in the life of the
world and yet above it.
In spirituality, then, understood in this sense, we must seek for the
directing light and the harmonizing law and in religion only in proportion
as it identifies itself with this spirituality. So long as it falls short of this, it is
one human activity and power among others, and, even if it to be
considered the most important and the most powerful, it cannot wholly
guide the others. If it seeks always to fix them into the limits of a creed, an
unchangeable law, a particular system, it must be prepared to see them
revolting from its control; for although they may accept this impress for
a time and greatly profit by it, in the end they must move by the law of
their being towards a freer activity and an un trammeled movement.
Spirituality respects the freedom of the human soul, because it is itself
fulfilled by freedom; and the deepest meaning of freedom is the power
to expand and grow towards perfection by the law of one’s own mature,
“dharma.” This liberty it will give to all the fundamental parts of our being.
It will give that freedom to philosophy and science which ancient Indian
religions gave, freedom even to deny the spirit, if they will, as a result of which
philosophy and science never felt in ancient India any necessity of divorcing
themselves from religion, but grew rather into it and under its light. It will
give the same freedom to man’s seeking for political and social perfection
and to all his other powers and aspirations. Only it will be vigilant to
illuminate them so that they may grow into the light and law of the spirit,
not by suppression and restriction, but by a self-searching, self-controlled
expansion and a many-sided finding of their greatest, highest and deepest
potentialities. For all these are potentialities of the spirit.
Face of the Kingdom of God - Spirituality versus Religion
There are two aspects of religion: one is the True Religion, the other
Religionism. True religion is spiritual, which seeks to live in the spirit, in
what is beyond the intellect, beyond the aesthetic and ethical and
practical being of man, and to inform and govern these members of our
248
being by the higher light and law of the spirit. Religionism, on the contrary,
entrenches itself in some narrow pietistic exaltation of the lower members or
lays exclusive stress on intellectual dogmas, forms and ceremonies, on some
fixed and rigid moral code, on some religio-political or religio-social system.
Not that these things are altogether negligible or that they must be
unworthy or unnecessary or that a spiritual religion need disdain the aid
of forms, ceremonies, creeds and systems. On the contrary, they are
needed by man because the lower members have to be exalted and
raised before they can be fully spiritualized, before they can directly
feel the spirit and obey its law. An intellectual formula is often needed by
the thinking and reasoning mind, a form or ceremony by the aesthetic
temperament or other parts of the infra-rational being, a set moral code
by man’s vital nature in their turn towards the inner life. But these things
are aids and supports, not the essence; precisely because they belong to the
rational and infra-rational parts, they can be nothing more and, if too blindly
insisted on, may even hamper the supra-rational light. Such as they are, they
have to be offered to man and used by him, but not to be imposed on
him as his sole law by a forced and inflexible domination. In the use of
them toleration and free permission of variation is the first rule which
should be supremely needful, the thing to which we have always to hold
and subordinate to it every other element or motive.
There got to be another better, efficient unknown system that could
lead humanity towards god and the humanity is still waiting for it.
Religionism is no good but religion is good, that is what we need today!
Jesus idea of religion is “The Kingdom of God”, which is a larger circle,
encompassing all religions, all nations, all organic, inorganic, physical,
spiritual, natural worlds and the entire universe. However, the minute,
you use the word “religions” you tend to draw a smaller circle, resulting
inevitably in religionism. The Kingdom of God: would be indeed, the
“unknown religious system” we’ve been eagerly waiting for. Establishment
of “new modes of being” of a “force unknown to the earth till today” would
constitute the foundation for Kingdom of God. The teachings of religions,
especially the teachings of Jesus on the Kingdom of god would provide
nourishing ground for such an experience. The general aim to be attained is
the advent of the progressive universal harmony. This means for attaining
this aim, with regard to the earth, is the realization of human unity through
the awakening in all and the manifestation by all of the inner Divinity
with One. In other words: to create unity by founding the Kingdom of God
which is within us all. This therefore is the most useful work to be done: (1)
249
Each one of us, individually, should be conscious in himself of the Divine
Presence and to Identify himself with it. (2) To individualize the states of
being that were never till now conscious in man and, by that, to put the
earth in connection with one or more of the fountains of universal force
that are still sealed to it. (3) To speak again to the world the eternal word
under a new form adapted to its mentality. It will be the synthesis of all
human knowledge. (4) Collectively, to establish an ideal society in a
propitious spot for the flowering of the new race, the race of the Sons of
God.
Since the infinite, the absolute and transcendent, the universal, the
One is the secret summit of existence and to reach the spiritual
consciousness and the Divine the ultimate goal and aim of our being and
therefore of the whole development of the individual and the collectivity
in all its parts and all its activities, reason cannot be the last and highest
guide; culture, as it is understood ordinarily, cannot be the directing light
or find out the regulating and harmonizing principle of all our life and
action. For reason stops short of the Divine and only compromises with the
problems of life, and culture in order to attain the Transcendent and infinite
must become spiritual culture, something much more than an intellectual,
aesthetic, ethical and practical training. Where then are we to find the
directing light and the regulating and harmonizing principle? The first
answer which will suggest itself the answer constantly given by the great
spiritual minds is that we shall find it directly and immediately in
consciousness. And this seems a reasonable and at first sight a satisfying
solution; for consciousness is that instinct, idea, activity, discipline in man
that aims directly at the Divine, while all the rest seem to aim at it only
indirectly and reach it with difficulty after much wandering and stumbling
in the pursuit of the outward and imperfect appearances of things. To
make all life conscious and govern all activities by the consciousness
would seem to be the right way to the development of the ideal individual
and ideal society and the lifting of the whole life of man into the Divine.
We must recognize the fact that in a time of great activity, of high aspiration,
of deep sowing, of rich fruit-bearing, such as the modern age with all its faults
and errors has been, a time especially when humanity got rid of much that
was cruel, evil, ignorant, dark, odious, not by the power of religion, but by the
power of the awakened intelligence and of human idealism and sympathy.
Human nature is that, when we reach a state of desperation, we
exercise our faith; otherwise, Spirit is the distant dream. The other way we
relate to the Divine is through death. When someone we know passes
250
from this Earth, we imagine a heaven where they reside in a bodiless
state, but similar to life as we know it. On the other hand, we rarely consider
the possibility of a Divine life on Earth. For millennia, we related to Spirit as
something “up there”, or “out there”, or beyond the beyond; a release into
an eternity, or as the ancient sages experienced, a merging into the
transcendence. The possibility that it is “right here” was taught by Jesus in
the parables of the Kingdom of God. Now we know the Kingdom of God is
right here and if we want to experience the Grace and Power, we have
ample opportunity to practice it while fully engaging in the details of
our lives. All we have to do is open to it. In fact, more and more we are
compelled to do so because the human mind alone can no longer resolve
the ever more complex problems of the world. Spirit can, however,
because it is capable of moving in multiple directions simultaneously
attracting instantaneous positive results, abridging space and time, and
defying normal causality and possibility. In that way, Spirit is the ultimate
problem solver. The end result of this movement is that we are all moving
to a new stage of human development and consciousness. First, we have
arrived at the first great point in our ascent; to mentality and rationality,
which is an enormous development and sign of human progress. This has
particularly been the case in the last 50 years. Then we move higher to
the next pinnacle of consciousness and discover and utilize the power of
the spiritual force that is there in the atmosphere, especially so in recent
decades. We then apply that power to the details of life perfecting and
divinizing it. As more and more individuals take to this approach, we see the
first signs of a new type of existence emerging; a first glimmer of a new spiritinfluenced and oriented society: the Kingdom of God. It is the ultimate
destination in our ascent to the Heights as a human species. This is indeed a
radical departure in spiritual history. It is no longer a life apart from life, or
eternal life after death, but the emerging of Divine Life right here on
earth, leading to the culmination in Heaven. In the interim, we are taking
intermediary steps to raise our consciousness and arrive at the realization
of our image of God. Higher attitudes, purifying and perfecting our
behavior, emerging higher personal values, a mind that embraces all
sides of an issue, and the ability to open to the spiritual force are several
of the bridging steps to the collective emergence of the Holy Spirit.
Eventually, these individuals can become the ultimate evolutionary
personality and being. These become the transformed Gnostic individuals,
filled with the Divine aspects and powers, living life for a Divine Purpose
and unfolding in creation. They act with a spiritual orientation and purpose,
251
bringing this Spirit to bear in all activities in life. He is infinitely creative,
dynamic, releasing the infinite potential of life into every moment by
bringing the Being, the Spirit into the becoming of every moment of our
existence. If a number of such divine-like humans (Image of God) emerge,
then there is the possibility of the development of a community of such
individuals, living within the greater community of society. Such
individuals may come together to help from a new social and collective
order and existence, culminating in the possibility of the emergence of
a divine life on Earth (the Kingdom of God). The Kingdom of God is the
great theme of the scriptures. God is the eternal King who rules now and shall
rule in the future. It is in the Kingdom of God that the purposes of God are
fulfilled. And since the term “Kingdom of God” is an important concept, it
is important to define the term and note the distinct ways it is used in the
scriptures. To get a clear picture of the Kingdom of God, a large number
of scripture verses needs to be studied. When we speak of a “Kingdom”
certain elements are included in our understanding of the term. The
normal use of the term kingdom expresses a dominion or physical sphere
of a rule involving a ruler, a people who are ruled, and a physical territory
where the rule takes place. As it is used in the scriptures, the term
“Kingdom of God” refers to the rule of the sovereign God over his creation.
In both the general concept of a kingdom and in the biblical idea of the
Kingdom of God, three essential elements are found. In a Kingdom of God
on earth, the old ways of life would disappear, such as mental idols,
constructed principles and systems, definitely all religions and their
conflicting ideals. There would be an end of war, political strife and all the
negatives that issues from it. Jesus came to earth to establish his Kingdom:
the Kingdom of God.
The Kingdom of God is what the Bible is all about! Notice that Jesus
mentions it here in Mk 1:14-15, at the start of his ministry: “the Kingdom of
God is at hand.” In the gospel of Mathew, the Kingdom is mentioned 55
times and it is a revolutionary teaching brought by Jesus, “Repent, for the
Kingdom of God is at hand,” announces the Baptist, and repeats Jesus
(Mat 3:3, 4:17). Repentance is seen here; withdrawal from arrogant,
political, social, selfish and doctrinal interpretations of religions, opening
up to new understanding, peace, tolerance, unity, the teachings of the
Kingdom of God. The Kingdom is never defined in the Gospel rather they
present it as “riddle.” It is something “so big” (big circle) that the whole
world can enter into it… each one of us has to enter into it (Jn 3:3-5, Matt
18:3). This symbolizes the universal encompassing ability of the kingdom,
252
biotic, abiotic, material spiritual (religions) and the whole universe for
that matter: excluding nothing. But it is “so small” (small circle) that it enters
into each one of us: it is within us (Lk 17:21, Matt 6:10). This symbolizes
the individualistic ability to discern within oneself the power of the
kingdom, realizing the importance of relationships, the need to be
connected with the whole: including everything. It is so big, that it is the
“mystical body of Christ,” his church… and it is something so small, that
it is the same Jesus in our hearts. The “Kingdom” and the “Church” are
considered the same thing in Mat 16:17-18… and this is why the apostles
never mentioned the Kingdom after the Gospels, because when they
mentioned the Church, or simply Jesus Christ, they were preaching the
Kingdom, their task (Matt 10:7, Lk 9:2). Jesus is the King and the Kingdom.
Jesus not only came to show us the Way, but he himself is “the Way” (Jn
14:6). The Kingdom of God is sanctified from the outer world of existence.
Entrance into the Kingdom is through the love of God, through
detachment, through holiness and chastity, through truthfulness, purity,
steadfastness, faithfulness and the sacrifice of life.
Again, the underlying current of the interviews was, “Why should
anyone believe you over others?” so indeed, why should anyone believe
what is written in either book? That is the whole point! People cannot
believe these things unless there is proof. This is part of the reason God
has chosen to reveal end-time events in the manner that he has. Through
the centuries, people have been lying about God. Every religion in this
world cannot be right about God. All of them can’t be true. The very
definition of “truth” cries out that only one thing can be true. Only one
way can be God’s way. This is a great dilemma for man. If the Catholics are
right in what they teach, then all the Protestant churches are wrong. If a
particular Protestant group is right, then the Catholics are wrong, and so
is every other Protestant group. If Judaism is true, then all Christianity is
false. Only one way and one truth can be genuine! Do you see the
dilemma? If the Pharisees were right, in the time of Christ, then the
Sadducees were wrong, and vice-versa. But Jesus Christ made it clear
that both of them were wrong! Only God can make the truth prevail. We
are at the very time when God is doing exactly that! After 6,000 years,
God is in the process of bringing the world into one order, away from the
control of man’s self-rule. Through the process of end-time events, God is
bringing the world under one government, with only one true religion.
God is beginning to make a distinction between what is his truth and all
that is false in the world. When all of it is finished, only the truth will
253
prevail; and, all lies and liars will have been exposed. Religion is the
greatest culprit of all when it comes to lying and deceit. Religion has had
a devastating impact on people in all nations of the world. You need to
know why! It is for this very reason that this earth is about to suffer more
than it has at any other time in history. The truth is, religion is the greatest
cause of suffering and evil in this world, and it is due to this that the
greatest clash of religion the world has ever known is about to erupt.
Do Religions come in Handy?
“In dark ages people are best guided by religion, as in a pitch black night a
blind man is the best guide; he knows the roads and paths better than a man
who can see. When daylight comes, however, it is foolish to use blind old men
as guides.” Heinrich Heine, Gedanken und Einfalle.
The following treatment reflects the modern philosophical trend,
therefore, the views expressed here, are not personal. Past and present
religious atrocities have occurred not because we are evil, but because
it is a fact of nature that the human species is, biologically, only partly
rational. Evolution has meant that our prefrontal lobes are too small, our
adrenal glands are too big, and our reproductive organs apparently
designed by committee; a recipe which, alone or in combination, is very
certain to lead to some unhappiness and disorder. But still, what a
difference when one lays aside the strenuous believers and takes up the
no less arduous work of Darwin, say or a Hawking or a Crick. These men
are more enlightening when they were wrong, or when they display
their inevitable biases, than any falsely modest person of faith who is
vainly trying to square the circle and to explain how he, a mere creature
of the creator, can possibly know what that creator intends. If you will devote
a little time to studying the staggering photographs taken by the Hubble
telescope, you will be scrutinizing things that are far more awesome and
mysterious and beautiful and more chaotic and overwhelming and
forbidding than any creation or “end of days” story. If you read Hawking
on the “event horizon”, that theoretical lip of the “black hole” over which
one could in theory plunge to see the past and the future. If you examine
the beauty and symmetry of the double helix, and then go on to have your
own genome sequence fully analyzed, you will be at once impressed
that such a near perfect phenomenon is at the core of your being, and
reassured that you have so much in common with other tribes of the
human species: “race” having gone, further fascinated to learn how much
you are a part of the animal kingdom as well.
254
How much effort it takes to affirm the incredible! The Aztecs12 had to
tear open a human chest cavity every day just to make sure that the sun
would rise. Pantheists and monotheists are supposed to pester their deity
more times than that, perhaps, lest he be deaf. How much vanity must be
concealed, not too effectively at that, in order to pretend that one is the
personal object of a divine plan? How much self respect must be
sacrificed in order that one may squirm continually in an awareness of
one’s own sins? How many needless assumptions must be made, and
how much contortion is required, to receive every new insight of science
and manipulate it so as to “fit” with the revealed words of ancient man
made deities? How many saints and miracles and councils and conclaves
are required in order first to be able to establish a dogma and then, after infinite
pain and loss and absurdity and cruelty, to be forced to rescind one of those
dogmas? God created man in his image and evidently, it was the other
way about, which is the painless explanation for the profusion of gods
and religions, and the fratricide both between and among faiths, that we
see all about us and that has so retarded the development of civilization.
There still remain some irreducible objections to religious faith: that is
wholly misrepresents the origin of man and the cosmos, that because of
this original error it manages to combine the maximum of servility with
the maximum of solipsism, that it is both the result and cause of dangerous
sexual repression, and that it is ultimately grounded on wish-thinking.
Archbishop James Ussher of Armagh, who calculated that the earth,
“earth” alone, mind you, not the cosmos had its birthday on Saturday, October
22, in 4004 BC, at six in the afternoon. This has been the constant trope,
ever since the first witch doctors and shamans learned to predict eclipses
and to use their half-baked celestial knowledge to terrify the ignorant.
Many social thinkers have noticed the more vulgar and obvious fact that
religion is used by those in temporal charge to invest themselves with
authority and power. Religion may speak about the bliss of the next world,
but it wants power in this one. This is only to be expected. It is, after all,
wholly man made. And it does not have the confidence in its own various
preaching even, to allow coexistence between different faiths. It is less of
a surprise to find some religions applying sterner laws to the poor, or offering
indulgences to the rich. Religions lack true understanding of God, tolerance,
12
A Native American state ruled much of what is now Mexico from about 1428 until
1521, when the empire was conquered by the Spaniards. The empire represented the
highest point in the development of the rich Aztec civilization that had begun more
than a century earlier.
255
and open-mindedness. In the secular world we do not hold our
convictions dogmatically: the disagreement between us sometimes is
quite wide as well as quite deep, but we shall resolve it by evidence and
reasoning and not by mutual excommunication. Religions tell you how to
think, how to speak, and how to write? Can you believe that? This is the
unfair price to pay if you are a believer.
Many believe with certainty that an ethical life can be lived without
religion. And they know for a fact that the corollary holds true, that religion
has caused innumerable people not just to conduct themselves no better
than others, but to award themselves permission to antagonize the human
weakness. In the very recent past, we have seen some religions befouled
by their complicity with the unpardonable sin of pedophilia. But other
non religious organizations have committed similar crimes, or even worse
ones. They are those who Blaise Pascal took into account when he wrote
to the one who says, “I am so made that I cannot believe.” Some scientists
believe that Homo sapiens and his brain not yet ready for a genuine
understanding of religion and god. Man has many religions but man has
only one God. The presence of hundreds and thousands of religions in
the world could suggest that man is not sure about god. Indeed, at man’s
evolutionary present, he does not yet possess the ability of knowing the
true god. At present time of humanity, man does not require any one to
police their doctrine. Sacrifices and ceremonies are abhorrent to him, as
are relics and the worship of any images or objects. To him no spot on
earth is or could be “holier” than another: to the ostentatious absurdity of
the pilgrimage, or the plain horror of killing civilians in the name of some
sacred wall or cave and shrine. Religion spoke its last intelligible or noble
or inspiring words a long time ago; either that or it mutated into an
admirable but nebulous humanism, as did, say, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a
brave Lutheran pastor hanged by the Nazis for his refusal to collude with
them. They shall have no more prophets or sages from the ancient quarter,
which is why the devotions of today are only the echoing repetitions of
yesterday, sometimes ratcheted up to screaming point so as to ward off
the terrible emptiness.
A consistent proof that religion is man-made and anthropomorphic
can also be found in the fact that it is usually “man” made, in the sense of
masculine, as well. The holy book in the longest continuous use, the Talmud
commands the observant one to thank his maker every day that he was not
born a woman. This raises again the insistent question: who but a slave
256
thanks his master for what his master has decided to do without bothering
to consult him? Some scriptures, as people condescendingly call it, has
woman cloned from man for his use and comfort. Saint Paul expressed
both fear and contempt for the female. I think we are entitled to at least
three provisional conclusions. The first is that religion is manufactured,
and that this salient fact is too obvious to ignore. The second is that ethics
and morality are quite independent of faith, and cannot mostly, be
derived from it. The third is that religion is, because it claims a special
divine exemption for its practices and beliefs, not just amoral but immoral.
Those who claim a heavenly warrant for the cruelty have been tainted
by evil, and also constitute far more of a danger. And I am content to think
that some contradictions will remain contradictory, some problems will never
be resolved by the mammalian equipment of the human cerebral cortex, and
some things are definitely unknowable. If the universe was found to be
infinite or finite, either discovery would be equally stupefying and
impenetrable to me. And though I have met many people much wiser and
cleverer than myself, I know of nobody who could be wise or intelligent enough
to say differently.
As I mentioned earlier, modern sociologists uniformly think that religion
is man made. Even the men who made it cannot agree on what their
prophets or redeemers or gurus actually said or did. Still less can they
hope to tell us the “meaning” of later discoveries and developments
which were: when they began, either obstructed by their religions or
denounced by them. And yet, the believers still claim to know! Not just
to know, but to know everything. Not just to know that god exists, and
that he created and supervised the whole enterprise, but also to know
what he demands of us, from our diet to our observances to our sexual
morality. It is a sheer arrogance to tell us that we already have all the essential
information we need. Such stupidity, combined with such pride, should
be enough on its own to exclude “belief” from the debate. The person
who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs
now to the infancy of our species. Religious faith is, precisely because
we are still evolving creatures, ineradicable. It will never die out, or at
least not until we get over our fear of death, and of the dark, and of the
unknown, and of each other.
Religion is a powerful tool at humanity’s disposal. But we don’t use it
right. Recently religion is found to be incapable of doing many things,
which are supposed to be doing. With all these religions, all that we
257
could do was: we were just able to watch in horror, unable to stop: the
First and Second World Wars, Nazi Holocaust13 mass murders in Sri Lanka,
genocide in Rwanda, war in Iraq and Afghanistan. More people died in the
hands of religions than in all the wars and natural calamities combined? Look
at all the crimes that have been committed in the name of God—the
Crusades, the Inquisition, and the wars that have seen millions who claim
to be Christian kill one another on opposing battle lines. But the truth is,
these people belie their claim to be followers of Jesus. His teachings and
way of life condemn their actions. Even a Hindu, Mohandas Gandhi, was
moved to say: “I love Christ, but I despise Christians because they do not
live as Christ lived.” Crusades and massacre in the narrow streets of
Jerusalem, where, according to the, hysterical and gleeful chronicles the
spilled blood reached up to the bridles of the horses. In South America,
millions of tribal people were massacred in the name of missions. The
twentieth century has seen huge numbers of young men of many nations
of both east and west in the grip of religiously intensified loyalties that
enabled them to commit cruel, merciless violence, even against helpless
civilians. Gradually, world has become more dangerous, another testimony
of religious inability. In a number of the most brutal conflicts of the last
half of the twentieth century, religious allegiances have injected a
justifying religious dimension, so that religion has provided the “mast” to
which the two sides have nailed their colors. For, as Pascal has said, “Men
never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious
conviction.” A major example is the mutual Hindu, Pakistan and Sikh
massacres in the Punjab after the partition of India in 1947, and in sporadic
communal conflict and violence in India ever since. Recent past we’ve
witnessed the ethnic cleansing in Serbia. Serbs themselves called it
“ethnic cleansing.” In fact it was “religious cleansing.” Catholic and
Orthodox forces were colluding in a bloody partition and cleansing of
Bosnia-Herzegovina. In 1998 to 1999, Taliban’s addiction to profanity that
it had methodically shelled and destroyed one of the world’s greatest
cultural artifacts: the twin Buddha statues at Bamiyan, which in their
magnificence showed the fusion of Hellenic and other styles in the Afghan
past. Reduction of Bamiyan to shards and rubble foreshadowed the
incineration of two other twin structures, as well as almost three thousand
human beings, in downtown Manhattan in the fall of 2001.
13
Holocaust, the almost complete destruction of Jews in Europe by Nazi Germany
and its collaborators during World War II. Hitler ordered the extermination of 6 million
Jews. Jews often refer to the Holocaust as “Shoah”, the word “holocaust” derives from the
Greek “holo” means “whole” and “caustos” means “burned”, and originally referred to a
burnt offering, or a religious sacrifice that is totally consumed by fire.
258
Other examples abound: The slower but even more destructive war
in Iraq, left us with a spreading violent legacy of deeply felt resentment;
the seemingly endless round of mutual revenge attacks between Israel
and the Palestinians, with tanks and helicopter gun-ships on the one side
and militant suicide bombers on the other; the proliferation of nuclear
weapons extending from the USA, UK, Russia and Israel potentially to
North Korea, Iran, India, Pakistan and possibly elsewhere; the Jewish-Arab
wars in Israel, Palestine and Lebanon; the Serbian and Bosnian and KosovoAlbanian conflicts in former Yugoslavia; the generations of CatholicProtestant violence in Northern Ireland; conflict between Ethiopia and
Eritrea: the continuing conflict in the Sudan … And in the seventeenth
century, during the thirty years war between Catholic and Protestant
powers, the competing armies ravage much of central Europe, plundering
as they marched and leaving farms, villages, towns and cities in ruins. The
western colonizing aggression of the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries
into South America, Africa, India and the Middle and Far East justified
itself as the extension of Christian civilization into heathen darkness. In all
these cases there were powerful motives of economic exploitation,
commercial expansion, political aggrandizement, individual greed and
ambition, all covered over in the public consciousness by a religious-racist
rationale. Indeed, in virtually every war that has ever been fought, god
has been believed by each set of combatants to be on their side. It
seems that the only cause that god really supports is the arms industry!
The world is big enough for all the believers and non believers. We don’t have
to push out any of us. The true believer cannot rest until the whole world
bows the knee. But, both in theory and in practice, religion uses the
innocent and the defenseless for the purpose of experiment. But if these
things can be preached under the protection of an established religion,
we are expected to take them at face value.
The Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 decreed that Jews should wear
distinguishable clothing; in 1290 the entire Jewish community of England
was expelled; the Spanish Inquisition forcibly converted Jews to
Christianity with threats of torture and death, the Grand Inquisitor,
Torquemada14 playing his notorious part in the late fifteenth century. And
Tomas de Torquemada (1420-1498), Spanish monk and grand inquisitor, known
for his ruthless administration of the Inquisition. A deeply religious and zealous Catholic
who felt that non-Catholics and insincere converts could destroy both the church and
the country, Torquemada used the Inquisition for the next 11 years to investigate and
punish heretics, apostates and others on an unprecedented scale. As it was in other
European judicial systems, torture was used to gain evidence, and a wide range of offenses
were prosecuted, including heresy, witchcraft, bigamy, and usury. About 2000 people
were burned at the stake during Torquemada’s term in office. He also supported the
expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492.
14
259
of course the old accusation of deicide lingered on in the background,
adding weight to the secular anti-Semitism of the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries, leading to the Holocaust of the 1940s. During the
medieval period the Catholic Inquisition busily rooted out heretics, such
as the Cathars, more than two hundred of whose leaders were burned
after the siege of their castle at Montsegur in 1242. But Protestants were
no less ready to persecute and burn. In England, Latimer and Ridley were
burned at the stake in Oxford in 1555 and Cranmer the following year.
Many Catholic priests in England were hounded down and killed during
the sixteenth century. In Calvin’s Geneva, Servetus was burned as a
Unitarian heretic in 1553. And during the “great witch graze” between
1450 and 1700, “millions were persecuted and tens of millions terrified
during one of the longest and strangest delusions in history”, with perhaps
a hundred thousand women burned or drowned: all of this instigated
and supported by the religions.
Inquisition
By this term “Inquisition,” is usually meant a special ecclesiastical institution for
combating or suppressing heresy. Its characteristic mark seems to be the bestowal
on special judges of judicial powers in matters of faith, and this by supreme
ecclesiastical authority, not temporal or for individual cases, but as a universal
and permanent office. In middle ages there were independent inquisitors who
traveled around giving their support to local tribunals and occasionally acting
independently. Later particular circumstances caused inquisition tribunals to be
set up in Spain, Portugal, Venice, Rome, the Netherlands and elsewhere. Cases of
heresy, were tried before the court of the local bishop with appeal to Rome but
in some areas it was felt that back up was required. Consequently, inquisitors
were appointed by the pope to carry out independent investigations as a second
front. The inquisitor was usually a member of one of the mendicant orders, either
a Franciscan or a Dominican monk who did not have any special powers except
those already enjoyed by the local bishop. However, it is likely that they held
considerable moral authority as they were educated men with a mandate from
Rome that would have helped ensure co-operation. The first direct commission
of inquisitors that we possess is Ille humani generis, a letter of Gregory IX to a
Dominican prior ordering him to send out inquisitors to deal with heresy in his
area. Later, the Spanish Inquisition worked under the auspices of the Spanish
crown and operated through out their empire. Although the Inquisition never
did operate in Britain, several Lollards were burnt in the fourteenth century and
Mary I (r. 1553 - 58) burnt nearly three hundred Protestants. The Goa Inquisition
was the office of the Inquisition acting in the Indian state of Goa and the rest of
the Portuguese empire in Asia. It was established in 1560, briefly suppressed from
260
1774–1778, and finally abolished in 1812. The Inquisition was established to
punish relapsed New Christians—Jews and Muslims who converted to
Catholicism, as well as their descendants—who were now suspected of practicing
their ancestral religion in secret. In addition, the Inquisition prosecuted nonconverts who broke prohibitions against the observance of Hindu or Muslim rites
or interfered with Portuguese attempts to convert non-Christians to Catholicism.
While its ostensible aim was to preserve the Catholic faith, the Inquisition was
used against Indian Catholics and Hindus as an instrument of social control, as
well as a method of confiscating victims’ property and enriching the Inquisitors.
Most of the Goa Inquisition’s records were destroyed after its abolition in 1812,
and it is thus impossible to know the exact number of the Inquisition’s victims.
Based on the records that survive, H. P. Salomon and I. S. D. Sassoon state, that
between the Inquisition’s beginning in 1561 and its temporary abolition in 1774,
some 16,202 persons were brought to trial by the Inquisition. Of this number, it is
known that 57 were sentenced to death and executed in person; another 64 were
burned in effigy. Others were subjected to lesser punishments or penance, but
the fate of many of the Inquisition’s victims is unknown.
Global Warming and Climate Change caused by alarming
development of relatively easy to use chemical and biological weapons
of mass destruction; the continuing thinning of the ozone layer and
developing global warming, caused largely by the massive everconsumption of the world’s non-renewable resources by the rich (also poor)
nations; the continuing gap between the wealthy northern and the poor
southern hemispheres, leaving millions in deep poverty, many suffering
from AIDS and other preventable diseases … all this, and more, is making
our world an increasingly dangerous place to inhabit. All these dangers
are all humanly created: most of these people belong to some religious beliefs.
They are all evils that we humans are inflicting on ourselves. The immediate
causes are geopolitical, social and economic. But the deeper cause lies in
human minds and hearts, and it is here that any fundamental solution has to
begin. If we could all see, and then treat, one another as fellow human
beings sharing the same fragile planet we would see war as insanity,
revenge as futile and counter-productive, disputes are resolvable with
goodwill on both sides, poverty as capable of being ended by intelligent
global co-operative planning, and moderation in the consumption of finite
resources of fuel and energy as a basic responsibility. So it is fundamentally
the inner life of humanity that has produced the outer political and
economic state of the world, and a safer future requires the development
of this inner life with its capacity for profound transformation. While the
261
damage done by some cults has usually been restricted to their own
followers, but, the great world religions, with their much greater power
over much greater numbers of people, have been responsible for evil on
a much vaster scale. In Africa and in India, many people are critical about
formal religions, particularly of the damage that missionaries were doing
to the culture. We should remember that religion always arises from
culture. Many countries have their own rich religious backgrounds which
evolved culturally with the psyche of the indigenous people. Converting
them to other religions is to cut the strand that binds them together with
other people emotionally, topographically and socially. Besides, the
people from these places have no difficulty in accepting the notion that
standards of ethics and morality could be derived in the absence of
religion.
Difference Between Spirituality and Religion
Human capacity for positive emotions is what makes us spiritual and
that to focus on the positive emotions is the best and safest route to
spirituality that we are likely to find. There was a time when there was no
religion on this Earth and now there is lots of it. I wonder why some
religions spread while others fade into obscurity? I believe that the
survival of the world’s great religions, relatively unchanged, for the last
two thousand years has been due as much to their ritual emphasis on the
positive emotions of faith, forgiveness, hope, joy, love, and compassion.
Over the past twenty thousand years, the forward march of spiritual
development, artistic skill, and culturally mandated, unselfish care of the
weak, supported by organized religion, has been inexorable. How can
we separate the spirituality of religion from its dangerous dogmatic
baggage? At first, the idea of distinguishing spirituality from religion
may seem impossible. Is not our spirituality often expressed using the
language, metaphors, and rituals of religion? How then, are cults and
religions different from spirituality?
The first difference is that religion refers to the interpersonal and
institutional aspects of religiosity that are derived from engaging with a
formal religious group’s doctrines, values, traditions, and co-members.
By contrast, spirituality refers to the psychological experiences of
spirituality that relate to an individual’s sense of connection with
something transcendent and are manifested by the emotions of awe,
love, compassion, gratitude and forgiveness. Second, religion arises from
culture; spirituality arises from biology. Religion and cults are as different
262
from spirituality as environment is from genes. Like culture and language,
religious faith traditions bind us to our own community and isolate us
from the communities of others. Like breathing, our spirituality is common
to all. On the one hand, religion asks us to learn from the experience of
our tribe; spirituality urges us to savor our own experience. On the other
hand, religion helps us to mistrust the experience of other tribes;
spirituality helps us to regard the experience of the foreigner as valuable
too. The third difference between religion and spirituality is that religion is
more cognitive and spirituality is more emotional. Thus, cognitive religious
schisms over belief divide the world, and at the same time limbic
commonalities toward “melody” bind the world together. Spirituality and
religion are both about love, but too often, in different religions the lovers,
dispute. However, trying to thrust your religious beliefs upon other people
is like telling them too much about your political beliefs; you must first
convert them or you will annoy them with your prejudices. When we
browbeat another person with our cognitive, of so intelligent, missionary
zeal, they may regard us as paranoid zealots. Of course, the problem is
that sometimes the most paranoid leaders exhibit an intuitive gift for
reading and manipulating the emotions of their followers. Religion involves
belief; spirituality involves trust.
A fourth difference between religion and spirituality is that cults and
religions tend to be authoritarian and imposed from without, while
spirituality is more likely to be democratic and arise from within. Both
cults and religions ask you to learn from the experience of others. Not
only do they demand obedience to an external power infinitely greater
than yourself, but they often involve deference to an intermediary
“instructor” who is elevated above you through his fancy robes,
education, and sacred ordination. He is a superior who will tell you how
to find God or “the way.” Religious education can become as authoritarian
and as unilateral as a military academy. Spirituality encourages you to learn
from your own experience. God, if one exists, lives within. The fifth difference
often cited by Western critics of religion is that spirituality is tolerant and
religion is intolerant. We are all spiritual beings, but as social science
professor Crane Brinton explained to us, “If you don’t believe your religion
is the only religion, you have no religion.” Most mystics and too few
religious leaders understand that deep spirituality is facilitated by humility
rather than by dogmatic certainty. While it is not controversial to suggest
that the positive emotions of spirituality are valuable, at the same time,
the rituals and cultural formats of the world’s great religions form the
surest way to pull our positive emotions into conscious reflection.
263
Is human spirituality evolving? Does natural selection favor a brain
with capacity for a deepening spiritual life? Spirituality is not primarily
about God, but about the sacred. The experience of mystical illumination,
awe, the sacred, call it what you will, is hardwired in the human brain.
Since humans have learned to induce involuntary excitation of the limbic
system, from within through sacred drugs and fasting of from without by
voluntarily reducing cortical inhibition of the limbic system through
meditation and sensory deprivation, some have wondered whether such
experiences are not an effort to move toward a new evolutionary level:
the accessing of a recently evolved facet of brain. Others believe that
such experiences are mere illusions produced by an adaptive reordering
of abnormal brain function. Neuroscience, like cultural anthropology, has
affirmed the relevance of religious ritual to connect with the limbic world
of emotion. The disciplined and rigidly formatted rites of meditation
prescribed by many of the world’s great religions are designed as a
gateway to spiritual “enlightenment.” Recently, however, more careful
epidemiological studies have shown that the putative causal link between
church attendance and health, although supported by a vast ‘scientific”
literature, may be due to other factors, like healthy lifestyles. In other
words, good health is associated with religious involvement; it is not caused
by religious involvement. Spirituality, like religion, becomes hoax when
its practitioners try to explain its effects too concretely, or ever-charge
for their services, or confuse or comfort with healing. Humanity evolved
to accept the truth that the highest values of humanity could be
expressed through limbic awe for the beautiful and through the enduring
guidance of positive emotions. Certainly, we must remain open to
experience, and we must remain open to the dimension of time. To
understand the role of faith, hope, and well-intentioned compassion in
our lives, we must focus on long-term results, not sentiments.
Youth and Religion – Contemplation or Conversion
In the modern world, too often religion appears on the news, and
lodges in the mind, as extremism, violence and aggression. To be sure,
religion is not the cause of conflict in the Balakans, the Middle East, Africa,
India or elsewhere. Instead it forms the fault-line along which sides divide.
But that in itself is a serious problem. When political conflict is religionized,
it is absolutized. What in politics are virtues—compromise, the willingness
to listen to both sides and settle for less than we would wish in an ideal
world—are, in religion, vices. Religion can therefore act not as a form of
conflict-resolution but, rather, conflict-intensification. I am struck by how
264
little anger there is in the literature medieval atrocities of religions, the
age of blood libels and accusations of Jewish guilt from ritual desecration
to the plague, the era of massacres, slavery, expulsions, forced conversions,
inquisitions, excommunications, suspensions, burning at the stake,
ghettoes and pogroms. We protest against suicide-bombers, religiously
motivated terrorists and preachers of hate of whatever faith. The religious
imperative to which we try to give voice is the one that says: create, do
not destroy, for it is my world you are destroying, my creatures you are
killing. The only force equal to a fundamentalism of hate is a counterfundamentalism of love. To this I add further concern about religion
generally. The prophets in Bible warned against a rift between holy and
the good, our duties to God and to our fellow human beings. It still exists
today. There are those for whom serving God means turning inward—to
the soul, the house of worship and the life of ritual and prayer. There are
others for whom social justice has become a substitute for religious
observance or God. Most religions teach us that serving God and serving
our fellow human beings are inseparably linked, and the split between
the two impoverishes both. Unless the holy leads us outward toward the
good, and the good leads us back, for renewal, to the holy, the creative
energies of faith run dry.
The truths of religion are exalted, but its duties are close at hand. It’s
not mainly the letter of the law is important, but shifting the law to life is
more effective. We know God less by contemplation than by emulation. The
choice is not between “faith” and “deeds,” for it is by our deeds that we
express our faith and make it real in the life of others and the world.
Religious ethics is refreshingly down-to-earth. If someone is lonely, invite
them home. If someone you know has recently been bereaved, visit them
and give them comfort. If you know of someone who has lost their job, do
all you can to help them find another. The sages called this “imitating
God.” They went further: giving hospitality to a stranger, they said, is
“even greater than receiving the divine presence.” That is religion at its
most humanizing and humane. This is what is happening around the world
in the new generation of youth. There is all the difference in the world
between the attempt to impose your faith on others and the willingness
to share it with others. Our faiths are different. Hinduism is not Christianity,
Christianity is not Buddhism, and Buddhism is not Judaism. Yet, when we
bring our respective heritages of wisdom to the public domain, we have
no need to wish to convert others. Instead, we are tacitly saying: if this
speaks to you, then please take it as our gift. Indeed it is yours already, for
wisdom and revelation belongs to all. The willingness non-coercively to
265
share our several traditions of moral insight is, in a religiously plural culture,
an essential part of the democratic conversation, indeed of social
beatitude. Eastern religions are more concerned to practice their faith in
freedom; they don’t have a desire to convert others to their religions.
They give “contemplation par t of it,” and ignore the rift-causing
“conversion part of it.” Some of them admit converts, but they do not
seek them—not because it is exclusive but because they do not believe
that you have to be converted to their religions to achieve salvation, a
place in “the world to come.” They have no desire to impose their views
on the majority. Their interests coincide with the basic principles of liberal
democracy: minimum government interference with private religious
practice and a public policy that is, as far as possible, neutral or inclusive
on controversial moral issues.
Today’s youth are serious about their religions, but do not want to
impose it on other people. A recent study conducted in colleges in
Pakistan concludes that 92.4 percent respondents overwhelmingly
considered religion to be an important factor in their lives though 51.7
percent admitted that they did not offer prayers regularly. In any case,
youth today expect more freedom in religious matters: obviously, they
don’t want any traffic controller or a police man who monitor their
religious practices. Most religions interfere with the freedom of human
person. God if free: therefore the human person, created in his image, is
also free. Hierarchy, inequality, the corruptions of power, the exploitation
of the week, imperial conquest and the enslavement of the peoples are
not justified merely because they exist. All these above mentioned factors
inhibit religious maturity. For the first time a gap is opened up between
‘is’ and ‘ought.’ Not everything that is, is good. Not all that is done, is right.
We can imagine a world different from the way it is now and has been in
the past; and because we can imagine it, we can decide to act in such a
way as to begin to bring it about. What God is conceived of as both
beyond the natural universe and endowing humanity with his most
distinctive attribute, creativity, a momentous human freedom is born. For
the first time, religion becomes a world-transforming rather than worldaccepting force. Youth feel today that most religions are sadistic in their
approach and they don’t approve of it, most of them vehemently protest
it. All the different forms of sadism which we can observe go back to one
essential impulse, namely, to have complete mastery over another person,
to make him a helpless object of our will, to become the absolute ruler
over him, to become his God, to do with him as one pleases. To humiliate
him, to enslave him, are means to this end and the most radical aim is to
266
make him suffer, since there is no greater power over another person
than that of inflicting pain on him, to force him to undergo suffering
without his being able to defend himself. The pleasure in the complete
domination over another person is the very essence of the sadistic drive.
Youth demand openness, transparency, and demand for a clear
distinction between freedom and religion. However, religions have to
rearrange their ways or remodel their man-made infrastructures, to
accommodate their legitimate claims. New religions, in their infancy years
need laws, rules, and hierarchy to nurture the spiritual growth of its
followers. At first, a child is almost totally dependent on its parents for
food and safety. But as the years pass, a parent must gradually let the
child do things for itself or it will never grow into an adult. This can be
painful. At first a child cannot walk without falling, or choose without
making mistakes. Yet in the fullness of time, if parenthood is successful,
the child appropriates the values of its parents and makes them its own.
Adolescent rebellion against religion also should be understood as part
of the growth. Hinduism, in the Vedic times has seen all the possible
enforcements, between 2500 and 1500 BC, it was the period of Brahminical
law, but by the time of young Buddha and young Mahavir between 500
and 300 BC, the new generation wanted a shift, more freedom, more
meaningful religious practices, and adequate doctrinal interpretations,
consequently demand for change was compelling: law to life, insensible
to sensible, doctrinal to conventional and hierarchical to social. As a result,
there was a sudden surge of spiritual development in the form of
movement, philosophy, theology, which lead to the birth of new religions
known as Buddhism and Jainism, which are not considered as cut offs
from Hinduism, but perfection of Hinduism. A 16th century Vijyanagara
Kingdom in south India, was known for its just rule under the great king
called Krishna Devaraya. His court honored all religious beliefs, very
ecumenical and respected their freedom. He valued man as a
representation of same species not man as a religious representation.
Unfortunately some organized religions are hesitating to make that shift:
law to life. In other words, man’s relationship with God is something
primordial, innate, and natural and there is no need for organized religions.
It matters not what you did, you were already forgiven and you need
only accept it by faith as Paul stated in Romans 10:9-10. Salvation is so
simple and organized religion has made it so difficult with traditions and
rules that God did not sanction.
267
Vijyanagara Empire
The Emperors of Vijayanagar whose empire compromised of almost the whole of
peninsular India, were great builders and spent lavishly on works of public utility,
i.e. tanks, reservoirs, lakes, palaces and temples. In temple building they continued
the traditions and styles of the Chalukyas, Cholas and Pandyas. These temples in
Andhra Pradesh and Deccan show marked traces of Chalukyan style, whereas
their temples in the south show Chola and Pandya influence. Built of hard stone,
the Vijayanagar temples are large structures with spacious mandapas and lofty
gopurams. One of the splendid temples of the time is the famous Harasa Rama
Temple at Vijayanagar built in the reign of Krishna Deva Raya (1509-1550 A.D.).
It is considered to be “one of the most perfect specimen of Hindu Temple
architecture.” The temple does not have a gopuram or tower. The four central
pillars are finely polished and decorated with beautiful sculptures, Panels of the
entire life of Rama and episodes from the Ramayana are delicately sculptured on
the exterior of the temple. The temple of Vithala also in Vijayanagar dedicated to
Vishnu is another gigantic structure started by Krishna Deva Raya in 16th century
AD. A large well built complex, it is on the pattern of the southern temples. It has
axial mandapas and small shrines and gopurams. It has a highly ornamented main
mandap with intricate picture compositions painted on the ceiling. This shows
that the art of sculpture and painting had attained a very high degree of
excellence during that period. The typical lofty gopuram is covered with excellent
sculptures. Other features of the temple are the exquisitely carved pillars and
the massive solid granite rathas with three huge wheels in the open courtyard.
In Africa, obviously religion is the cause of major conflicts causing
damage and bloodshed. It has to change and fortunately it is changing in
India. Surprisingly, youth remained untouched by outcome of the recent
verdict of Allahabad court on the Babri Masjid.15 The verdict came to be
a source of happiness for some and sadness for others. If there was a
section that remained untouched by the verdict, it was those who were
born around the time or after the demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992. The
verdict on Babri Masjid came amid a very tense and heated environment
with a curfew like situation all over India. In some of the cities, an
emergency holiday was declared for schools as well as offices. The
situation was very edgy! Most of them appeared vague, while most
seemed to know that a mosque existed, which was later about to be
demolished, where originally the Hindu god Rama was born. The verdict
got excited only the old people and they seem to have difference of
15
In December 1992 gangs of militant Hindu youths stormed the Babri Majid mosque
and demolished it, sparking serious protests by Muslims, police firings, and then HinduMuslim riots, with a particularly terrible one in Mumbai; thousands lost their lives in
Ayodhya, India, where originally the Hindu god Rama was born.
268
opinion. But younger people don’t care, if the land goes to the Hindus or
Muslims. The land is going to be in India and it will still belong to Indians.
Almost all agree that it was pointless to fight over religion and felt that
the case had lost its significance in the current-day scenario. “I am a
staunch Hindu, but I don’t think it would have affected me in any way had the
land been given to the Muslims. I think, our generation is more tolerant than
the previous one,” commented Swathi Kasi, a young girl from A. Kattupadi,
Vellore, with a smile.
Kick-Out Religious Bigotry
A bigot is a person who is utterly intolerant of any creed, belief, or
opinion that differs from his own. There are political bigots, social bigots,
caste bigots and religious bigots. In practical terms, bigotry is about how
you relate to someone who disagrees with you. Here we are concerned
about religious bigotry. At the heart of religious bigotry is an unwillingness
to accept the truth that all men are equally sinful and desperately in
need of the mercy of God. This is illustrated in the parable of the Pharisee
and the tax-gatherer in Luke 18:10-14: But viewing himself as different
than the tax-gatherer allowed the Pharisee to look upon the tax-gatherer
with contempt, disdain, arrogance, ridicule, and intolerance. The Pharisee
was truly a bigot. Whether we trust our religious correctness, our
theological correctness, our political correctness, or any other ‘correctness’,
the result will be the same: like the Pharisee, we will view ourselves as
different, than others and, consequently, treat them with contempt and
intolerance. And that is bigotry. Teaching our children to fight bigotry is
good for their mental health, and good for our society. The cultural
changes are difficult to achieve but we can help by teaching our children
that bigotry and discrimination is wrong and must not be allowed. It’s
time to blow the whistle on the religious bigotry, sectarian attitudes and
behavior that tarnish our religions. Kick-out Bigotry against sectarianism.
Spirituality will Continue
Besides genetic and cultural evolution, there is yet a third form of
evolution at work in the maturation of human spirituality, adult
development. Our mastery of the positive emotions grows as we mature.
Having sketched the development (phylogeny) of positive emotions for
the species over the millennia, let me sketch the individual embryology
(ontogeny) of positive emotions over a lifetime. The maturation of our
organs is largely completed by puberty. Indeed, after age twenty, nearly
every organ in our body begins inexorably to decline. Only the human
269
brain, and thus our capacity for integrating the prose and passion,
continues to develop biologically until at least age sixty. As we mature,
our frontal lobes become ever more securely wired to the rest of our
limbic system. In more scientific language, the embryological
myelinization (insulation) of the connecting neural tracts increases, at
least until we are sixty. The frontal cortex, the seat of our social morality,
can be both limbic and neocortical at the same time. It took the Catholic
Church two millennia of cultural evolution and John Paul II eighty years
of personal maturation for a Vatican pope to master paradox and finally
refer to Jews and Muslims as “brothers.” If the bad news is that maturation
takes a long time, the good news is that once you learn to ride a bicycle
or fully understand that all women and all men are created equal, it is
hard to forget.
Like Albert Einstein, as we mature, we understand that time is an
important dimension that determines the shape of reality. Deepening
understanding of the relativity and complexity of life transforms immature
belief into mature trust and transforms rigid religious belief into spiritual
empathy. Or to translate the idea into the rhetoric of Saint Paul and into
the poetry of the King James Bible: “When I was a child, I spoke as a child,
I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I
put away childish things. For now we see through a glass darkly; but then
face to face.” (1 Corinthians 13: 11-12). I suggest that a faith emphasizing
trust and positive emotion is more mature than a faith made up of words,
prohibitions, and rigid beliefs. Am I not asserting that one is better than
the other? In so doing, I risk inventing a circle that draws me in and
excludes others. Butterflies, however, are not better than caterpillars, nor
are grandparents better than the grandchildren they adore. Butterflies
are only caterpillars at a different level of maturation. Feelings and passion
are not better than prose and belief; they simply arise in different parts of
the brain. Only connect the prose and the passion! That is what human
evolution is all about. Human brains, like human culture, take time to
mature. Maturation and spirituality unfold together, but not very fast. The
child wants to know who moves the clouds and why. If told the wind, he
wants to know who moves the wind and so on … This ceaseless chaining
of causes inevitably ends in a “superior being.” In the modern threeyear-old, Neolithic animism is still alive and well.
Over the millennia, through cultural evolution, religions have evolved.
Evidence of organized religion accompanied evidence of stable
settlements seven to twelve millennia ago. The growth of religion
paralleled the growth of towns and then cities. Nevertheless, until two
270
thousand years ago great cities arose only to disappear. Religions based
on power, guilt, retaliation, and hierarchy could not sustain the world’s great
cities. Ur, Babylon, Mohenjo-Daro, Carthage, Thebes. Machu Picchu, the
Mayan metropolis of Tikal, and the early Indian, Chinese and Egyptian
capitals all have vanished forever beneath sand, fields, and jungle
creepers. Not until a transformative millennium, a millennium extending
from 600 BC to 700 BC, did Buddhism, Confucianism, Christianity, and
Islam become established. Karen Armstrong has titled this period the
“Axial Age.” “ The Axial Age pushed forward the frontiers of human
consciousness and discovered a transcendent dimension in the core of their
being, but they did not necessarily regard this as supernatural.” If the Buddha
or Confucius had been asked whether he believed in God, he would
probably have winced slightly and explained with great courtesy that
this was not an appropriate question. What mattered to Confucius, Socrates,
Christ, and Isaiah was not what you believed but how you behaved. Show
me, don’t tell me. “God” was the experience of loving compassion, not an
all-powerful, judgmental, and often and often angry patriarch. Although
it may sound incongruous to some modern ears, these newer organized
religions emphasized love and compassion rather than fear and
dominance. It was this transformative millennium that may have permitted
great cities to endure. Religions needed to look beyond the letter of the
law and to distinguish between metaphor and myth. Today the challenge
still remains for Jews, Christians, Hindus, and Muslims to learn to regard
one another as fully human. The cultural invention of the Internet may be
a step forward. Unlike early cities of history that self-destructed, the more
modern communities that have survived successfully transformed the
city from a concatenation of competing tribes into a more egalitarian
hive.
I believe that we do not have to be taught positive emotions. Our
brain is hardwired to generate them. Humanity’s task is to pay attention
to them, for they are the source of our spiritual being and the key to our
cultural evolutionary progress. For the last three thousand years, organized
religions, for all their limitations, have been the best means that humanity
has found for bringing the positive emotions into conscious reflection.
Only by noting the long-term consequences of competing faith traditions
can we separate evolutionary truth from scriptural superstition. We need
to bring our positive emotions to conscious attention, and we must not
disdain to study them with our science. It is very urgent that humanity
should restore our faith in spirituality as an essential striving. I think that
271
spirituality is not rooted in ideas, sacred texts, and theology. Rather,
spirituality comprises positive emotion and social connection. Love is the
shortest definition of spirituality. Both spirituality and love result in
conscious feelings of respect, appreciation, acceptance, sympathy,
empathy, compassion, involvement, tenderness, and gratitude. Spirituality
reflects humanity’s biological press for connection and community
building as much as it reflects the individual’s need for sacred revelation.
Spirituality is more about “us” than “me”. Thus, I would suggest that our
spirituality is made manifest not as much by our inner enlightenment
and our prayers as by our outward behavior. For example, Jesus Christ
and Karl Marx are not usually paired, but both men were revolutionaries
who mistrusted organized religion because religion talked about, without
actually creating, loving communities. True followers of Christ should
denounce outdated, suppressive and authority obsessed religions and
its hierarchy for bringing in the needed change according to times.
Religion has played a very uneven role in such cultural evolution. On
the one hand, religious beliefs have provided cultural justification for
some of the most heinous and selfish human behavior ever committed.
On the other hand, for all their intolerant dogma, religions have provided
communities with a unifying view of the human condition and have often
provided the portal through which positive emotions are brought to
conscious attention. While neither Freud nor psychiatric textbooks ever
mention emotions like joy and gratitude, religious hymns and psalms
give these emotions pride of place. However, the present generations are
looking for a divinity beyond the conventional teachings of all religions.
Hence, these people are not Godless, but they are in a relentless and continuous
pursuit or quest for God. The modern godlessness does not take the form
of a fundamental and general criticism of religion but in an expression of
freedom from a specific notion of God or religion, because they are not
related to praxis; they are not put into practice by a cult. As a result, to
some degree they remain voluntary and random. However, that is
accepted in order to avoid a closer tie with religious institutions. The
question is, though, whether a concrete experience of the divine can be
communicated in these ‘free forms’ distanced from institutionalized
religion; a shift into agnosticism cannot be ruled out. There can be a loss
of religious experience, and that will already make talk of a divine reality
problematical. Conversions are the result of the unsatisfying quest for
spirituality. Joining in a cult or a belonging to a religion doesn’t mean that
they found a true divinity, but, on the other hand, it’s just a ‘stop over’ before
the quest could continue.
272
Bibliography
1.
Celibacy, Prayer and Friendship by Christopher Kiesling, O.P. Alba
House, New York, 1978
2.
Transforming Religion, edited by Felix Wilfred - Religious Seeds of
Social Transformation and Harmony by Dr. Roy Lazar, ISPCK,
Department of Christian Studies, Madras University, Chennai, 2009.
3.
Religion and Subaltern Agency by G. Patrick, University of Madras,
Chennai, 2003.
4.
Anthropological Insights for Missionaries by Paul G. Hiebert, Baker
Boo House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1994.
5.
Wisdom of the Ages and the Defining Moments, by Daniel O’Leary,
The Tablet, 24 th January 2009 and19 th September, 2009, London,
England.
6.
Shrine Family Digest by William Maema, August 2009, Nairobi,
Kenya.
7.
The many Faces of the Divine, edited by Herman Haering and
Johann Baptist Metz, SCM Press, London, 1995
8.
The Sacred Stupas by Benroy K. Behl, Frontline, November 21,
2008.
9.
Drawn to the Divine by William E. Reisner, S.J, Ave Maria Press,
Notre Dame, Indiana, 1987.
10.
A Delight in Company by Daniel O’Leary, Article featured in The
Tablet, London, England.
11.
Holy War Examined by John P. Shanley. Infinity Publishing Company,
West Conshohocken, PA. 2009.
12.
The Human Cycle by Sri Aurobindo, Sri Aurobindo Ashram,
Pondicherry, 1998.
13.
Overman, The Intermediar y Between the Human and the
Superamental Being by Georges Van Vrekhem, Rupa and Company,
New Delhi, 2005.
14.
God, Gods and divinity in the Hindu tradition of the Pancaratra by
Abgelika Malinar.
273
15.
God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens, Atlantic Books, London,
2007.
16.
The God of life and the revival of Religion by Pablo Richard.
17.
Human Gnome, Autobiography of a Species by Matt Ridley, Harper
Collins, New Delhi, 2009.
18.
The Divine in a Godless Society by Johann Figl.
19.
The Fifth Dimension, An Exploration of the Spiritual Realm by John
Hick, One World, Oxford, England, 2006.
20.
Death was Never Born, Life Never Died, Reincarnation or Evolution?
By Dwarakanth Reddy, Chennai, 2009.
21.
A History of Religious Ideas by Mircea Eliade, University of Chicago
Press, 1978.
22.
India Handbook, by Robert and Roma Brandnock, Passport Books,
NTC Publishing Group, Chicago, USA.
23.
Cultural History of India, Edited by A. L. Basham. Oxford University
Press, London, 2007.
24.
2008-God’s Final Witness by Ronald Weinland. The-end. Com. Inc.
Publications, Wantirna South, Australia.
25.
Sick Planet. The Impact of Corporate Food and Medicine by Stan
Cox. Harper Litmus, 2008.
26.
Too Poor for Peace? Global Poverty, Conflict, and Security in the
21 st Century, by Brainard, Lael, and Derek Chollet. Washington,
Booking Institurion Press, 2007.
27.
Common Wealth. Economy for a Crowded Planet by Jeffrey Sachs.
The Penguin Press, New York, 2008.
28.
The Ten Trusts by Jane Goodhall and Marc Bekoff, Harper, San
Francesco. A Division of Harper Collins Publications, 2002.
29.
The Third Jesus. How to Find Truth and Love in Today’s World by
Deepak Chopra. Rider, London, 2008.
30.
The Meaning of Life in World Religions by Joseph Runzo and Nancy
M. Martin. One World, Oxford, 2007.
274
Chapter IV
Engine Number Two - Science
Role of Science in Human Evolution
“God and Nature first made us what we are, and then out of our own created
genius we make ourselves what we want to be … Let the sky and God be our
limit and Eternity our measurement.”
(Marcus Garvey 1887-1940)
“Our age rejoices, and justly so, in the remarkable progress that has been made
in scientific and philosophical knowledge.”
(John XXIII, Pacem in Terris, no. 11)
Science is as old as universe itself. Science is God-made. On the other
hand, religion is man-made. Hence, our attention should be also equally
on science, as well as on religion. Science has been around 15 billion
years, but religions just a twinkling of an eye. When the world dies, science
would outlive any odds, but religions will not. Science is about
understanding, but progress in science is driven by misunderstanding.
Many have seen harmony rather than conflict between faith and science.
Until about five hundred years ago, there had been no such wall
separating science and religion. Back then they were one and the same.
It was only when a group of religious men who wished “to read God’s
mind” realized that science would be the most powerful means to do so
that a wall was needed. These men, among them Copernicus, Galileo,
Kepler, Newton, Descartes and Leibniz and, much later, Darwin began to
articulate and internalize the scientific method. These are known as
“Illuminati.” These people belonged to a group in various time periods
claiming to have received special religious and scientific enlightenment,
especially an 18th century German secret society with deist and republican
ideas. Science took off for the stars, and institutional religion, choosing to
deny the new revelations, could do little more than build a protective
wall around itself. Science has carried us to the gateway to the universe. And
yet our conception of our surroundings remains the disproportionate
view of the still small child. We are spiritually and culturally paralyzed,
unable to face the vastness, to embrace our lack of centrality and find
our actual place in the fabric of nature.
I believe that our best hope of preserving the exquisite fabric of life
on our world would be to take the revelations of science to heart. I would
suggest that science is, at least in part, informed worship. My deeply held
belief is that if a god of anything like the traditional sort exists, then our
curiosity and intelligence are provided by such a god. We would be
unappreciative of those gifts if we suppressed our passion to explore the
universe and ourselves. On the other hand, if such a traditional god does
not exist, then our curiosity and our intelligence are the essential tools for
managing our survival in an extremely dangerous time. In either case the
enterprise of knowledge is consistent surely with science; it should be
also with religion, and it is essential for the welfare of the human species.
Books about religion generally fall into one of two categories: those that
want to persuade you of the plausibility of religion and those that want to
do the opposite. In recent years the topic of “science and religion” has
become almost synonymous, with debates about evolution and
cosmology. Historical notions about famous individuals, especially Galileo
Galilei and Charles Darwin; philosophical assumptions about miracles,
laws of nature, and scientific knowledge; and the discussions of the
religious and moral implications of modern science, from quantum
mechanics to neuroscience, are regular features of science. However,
history records that whatever science and orthodoxy have been fairly
opposed, the latter has been forced to retire from the lists, bleeding and
crushed if not annihilated; scotched, if not slain.
The Illuminati
The Order of the Illuminati was established on May 1, 1776 at the University of
Ingolstadt, then part of the Kingdom of Bavaria, in Germany, by a professor of law
called Adam Weishaupt (1748-1830). The Illuminati were an interesting
organization, with both esoteric rituals and a political aim, based on the
Enlightenment philosophy and ultimately aimed at overthrowing the Roman
Catholic and politically conservative Kingdom of Bavaria and replacing it with a
liberal republic. Since Illuminati literally means ‘enlightened ones’ in Latin, it is
natural that several unrelated historical groups have identified themselves as
Illuminati. Often, this was due to claims of possessing gnostic texts or other arcane
information not generally available. The singular form is Illuminatus, also the
term used to describe a member of such a group. Illuminati is a Greek word
meaning Illumination a name given to those who submitted to Christian baptism.
Those who were baptized were called Illuminati or Illuminated/ Enlightened
Ones by the Ante-Nicene clergy, on the assumption that those who were
instructed for baptism in the Apostolic faith had an enlightened understanding.
The Alumbrados, a mystical 16th-century Spanish sect, were among the societies
276
that subsequently adopted the name Illuminati. The designation illuminati was
also in use from the 14th century by the Brethren of the Free Spirit, and in the
15th century was assumed by other enthusiasts who claimed that the illuminating
light came, not by being communicated from an authoritative but secret source,
but from within, the result of exalted consciousness, or “enlightenment.” A
movement of freethinkers that were the most radical offshoot of The
Enlightenment—whose adherents were given the name Illuminati: the group
has also been called the Illuminati Order, “Perfectibilists,” the Order of the
Illuminati, and the Bavarian Illuminati. In the conservative state of Bavaria, where
the progressive and enlightened elector Maximilian III Joseph von Wittelsbach
was succeeded (1777) by his conservative heir Karl Theodor, and which was
dominated by the Roman Catholic Church and the aristocrac y, such an
organization did not last long before it was suppressed by the powers of the day.
In 1784, the Bavarian government banned all secret societies, including the
Illuminati and the Freemasons. The structure of the Illuminati soon collapsed, but
while it was in existence many influential intellectuals and progressive politicians
counted themselves as members. About the time that the Illuminati were
outlawed in Bavaria, the Roman Catholic Church prohibited its members from
joining Masonic lodges, on pain of excommunication.
We Believe All that is Seen and Unseen
The conflicts between science and religion are man-made. The image
of conflict has also been attractive to some religious believers, who use it
to portray themselves as members of an embattled but righteous minority
struggling heroically to protect their faith against the oppressive and
intolerant forces of science and materialism. Although the idea of warfare
between science and religion remains widespread and popular, recent
academic writing on the subject has been devoted primarily to
undermining the notion of an inevitable conflict. The story is not always
one of a heroic and open-minded scientist clashing with a reactionary
and bigoted religion. Debates about science and religion are, on the
face of it, about the intellectual compatibility or incompatibility of some
particular religious belief with some particular aspect of scientific
knowledge. Does belief in life after death conflict with the findings of
modern brain science? Is belief in the holy books incompatible with
believing that humans and chimpanzees evolved from a common
ancestor? Scientific knowledge is based on observations of the natural
world. But observing the natural world is neither as simple nor as solitary
an activity, as it might sound. The point is that while it is certainly true that
scientific knowledge is based on and tested against observations of the
natural world, there is an awful lot more to it than just pointing your sense
organs in the right direction. We should also notice, by the way, that what
science often aims to show is that things in themselves are not as they
277
initially seem to us, that appearances can be deceptive. The earth beneath
our feet certainly seems to be solid and stable, and the sun and the other
stars appear to move around us. But science eventually showed that,
despite all the sensory evidence to the contrary, the earth is not only
spinning on its own axis but is also hurtling around the sun at great speed.
People sometimes say that science is just a systematization of
empirical observations, or nothing more than the careful application of
common sense. However, it also has the ambition and the potential to
show that our senses deceive us and that our basic intuitions may lead us
astray. But when you look up at the night sky, you may not be thinking
about astronomy and cosmology at all. You may instead be gripped by a
sense of the power of nature, the beauty and grandeur of the heavens,
the vastness of space and time, and your own smallness and insignificance.
This might even be a religious experience for you, reinforcing your feeling
of awe at the power of God and the immensity and complexity of his
creation, putting you in mind of the words of Psalm 19: “The heavens
declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.” Debates
about science and religion virtually always involve disagreements about
the relative authority of different sources of knowledge. Science and
religion have a shared concern with the relationship between the
observable and the unobservable. The Nicene Creed 1 includes the
statement that God made “all that is, seen and unseen.” St Paul wrote in
his letter to the Romans that “since the creation of the world God’s invisible
qualities, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen,
being understood from what has been made.”
Stone Tools – The Dawn of Science and Technology
The world’s ancient science and technology is undoubtedly, stone
tools. One of the most difficult questions facing scientists trying to
interpret the behavior of early hominins is: who made the tools found at
the sites? It had always been presumed that members of the genus Homo,
with their bigger brains and more human-like bodies, were the makers of
the stone and bone tools found at sites both in southern and East Africa.
However, recent work on the morphology of the robust australopithecines,
1
The first creed so named was adopted at the first Council of Nicaea in AD 325 to
settle a controversy concerning the persons of the Trinity. It was intended to cover debated
questions as to the divinity of Christ, and it introduced the word homoousios (Greek, “of
the same substance”) to correct the error of the homoiousian (“of like substance”) party.
To it were added several clauses against Arianism.
278
and increasing discoveries of these more “primitive” hominins in direct
association with tools, mean that the robust ape-men cannot be excluded
as possible tool users and makers. Nevertheless, with no direct way of
linking any single species to the tools recovered with their remains, and
considering that practically every site in the right time range contains
both Homo and Paranthropus remains. Scientists are still a long way from
discovering exactly which hominin made which tools. The earliest stone
tools discovered so far are from the Gona area in Ethiopia, and are
believed to date back to approximately 2.5 million years ago. The
appearance of stone tools has been linked to the development of our genus,
Homo. However, the Gona tools predate by 100,000 years the earliest
Homo specimens found so far, which suggests either that an earlier form
of Homo still remains to be found, or that the australopithecines like
Australopithecus garhi were capable of making stone tools. Stone tools
are categorized into “cultures” depending on how they were made or
used. The basic categories are:
1. Oldowan: It is a crude and limited stone tool kit associated with the
Early Stone Age, and named after the Olduvai Gorge site in Tanzania
where the first examples were found (for more information, refer to
Chapter one).
2. Acheulian: It is a more refined and complicated tool kit that
developed during the Early Stone Age (1.6 mya) and lasted until
approximately 250,000 years ago, named after the French site of Saint
Acheul.
3. Later Stone Age: This continued in Africa far longer than it did in
Europe; these tools are more specialized and more diverse than the earlier
tool technologies.
The Cradle of Humankind 2 contains a representative sample of almost
all stone tool types manufactured by humans and their ancestors over
the last 2 million years in Africa. The Oldowan tools found in the Cradle of
Humankind date back to approximately 2 million years ago and have
been found at sites such as Sterkfontein, and recently at the Coopers site
2
The 47,000 hectare Cradle of Humankind is a unique location in South Africa blessed
with a greater wealth of the prehistory of humankind than almost any other place on
Earth. Officially called the Sterfontein, Swartkrans, Kromdraai and environs world
heritage Site, the Cradle contains more than 12 major fossil sites and dozens of minor
ones that present us with an intriguing mixture of mystery and revelation about much
of our ancient past.
279
(South Africa). These tools are really just flakes, the result of reducing a
large stone to a smaller stone, and show little if any control over the end
design. Included in the Oldowan culture (East Africa) are simple hammerstones, which may have been nothing more than readily available river
cobbles. The more advanced tools of the Acheulian industry have been
found at Swartkrans, and in the river gravels around the Cradle Nature
Reserve (South Africa). They are believed to date back to approximately
1.5 million years ago. The core element of the Acheulian tool kit is the
hand axe. This bifacial, teardrop-shaped tool was the early Pleistocene
equivalent of the Swiss Army knife, and was used for just about any task
Homo erectus, the presumed maker of the Acheulian industry, might
have wished to accomplish.
The Acheulian industry shows that deliberate choice was introduced
into the tool-making process, from the raw material to the “style” of the
end product. It is the most enduring tool culture in history, existing for
well over a million years with little variation. The same templates have
been found across the world, from Africa to Europe and Asia. The Acheulian
ended only about 250,000 years ago, which may be associated with the
rise of Archaic Homo sapiens who, with a bigger brain size and more
developed communication skills, developed a new kind of tool industry. At
sites such as Swartkrans and Plover’s Lake, one can see evidence of flake
industries and prepared core industries. This is a period that is termed
the “Middle Stone Age” in Southern Africa. Points and blades began to
appear and some of the finely crafted stone tools were hafted on to
spears. In the coastal regions of Southern Africa, new evidence is emerging
that the Middle Stone Age was characterized by a technological
complexity never before realized, with bone points and even artwork
appearing contemporaneously with what used to be considered
“primitive” human technologies.
The timing of the transition from Middle Stone Age to Later Stone Age is
complex, with evidence that in some areas “modern” complex tools and
culture appeared very early, while in other areas the transition from
Middle Stone Age behavior to the modern “infinite” tool kit and behavior
may have occurred as recently as 20,000 years ago. Early and Middle
Stone Age tools were characterized by their limitations: they were used
essentially for bludgeoning, scraping, and cutting. The evolution of
modern human behavior saw the emergence of a far more complex tool
kit, with stone, bone and wooden tools having an infinite variety of uses,
from stitching clothing to harpooning fish. Later Stone Age tools were
280
also influenced by an aestheticism that was not prevalent in early tool
cultures, reflecting the increasing sophistication of evolving human
interaction. Later Stone Age tools used by the San hunter-gatherers3 are
microlithic and far more specialized than Early and Middle Stone Age
tools. The evidence for Later Stone Age occupation of the Cradle of
Humankind is extensive. Almost every cave has some evidence of modern
human occupation, and microlithic tools are widespread.
A Whole New World – Homo scientificus
What can we say of the mental machinery of humans, three times
greater than that in the large primates? There seems to be an obvious
explanation: science and technology. “Science and technology has long
been regarded as the driving force behind human brain expansion,” says
Harry Jerison, of the University of California at Los Angeles. Indeed, one
of the most influential concepts of human origins during this century was
encapsulated in a little book that Kenneth Oakley wrote in 1949: “Man the
Tool Maker.” Oakley, a major figure at the British Museum for many years,
and the uncoverer of the “Piltdown hoax”4 argued that not only did man
make tools, but, effectively, tools made man. In other words, as natural
selection honed the manipulative skills required for tool making, a bigger
brain evolved, making us more human. The image is of a positive
evolutionary loop, in which greater manipulative skills required greater
brain power, which in turn permitted a more developed technology, and
so on. This seemed a reasonable argument, not least because in many
ways we see ourselves as highly skilled technological creatures. At present,
Homo sentiens is making a shift toward Homo scientificus. As a result, a
new world is being born before the very eyes of the human race, a
radically different age, different in every dimension. Yet this brave new
world needs to answer the searching and inexorable challenge to the
human race, namely, the value of human life itself. The question is
fundamental. For a long time anthropologists accepted the idea that
The San, members of a traditional hunter-gatherer society, live throughout much of
the Kalahari Desert in southern Africa.
3
4
Piltdown hoax, was a famous scientific hoax involving the supposed discovery near
Piltdown, England, of an apelike fossil ancestral to modern humans. Reported in 1912,
the discovery included fragments of what were later proved to be a modern human
cranium and the jawbone of an ape. The so-called Piltdown man fossil was assigned a
genus, Eoanthropus (“dawn man”), and a species, dawsoni, named after the discoverer,
Charles Dawson, an amateur naturalist. For many years the Piltdown man fossil was a
subject of anthropological controversy. In 1953, scientific analyses proved the fossil a
forgery.
281
technology, not social interaction, was the driving force behind the
evolution of the human intellect. Given that our physical world is
dominated by the fruits of clever invention, it is not surprising that we
are impressed by human technological skills. And it is natural that such
skills should be thought of as the direct products of natural selection.
With the advancement in science and the cracking of the atomic
code, man became capable of destroying life on earth on a scale
undreamed of in his philosophies; with the cracking of the genetic code,
man became capable of manipulating and controlling human nature itself.
Both discoveries have empowered man to threaten his own dignity, his own
freedom and his own very existence. By the same token, supported by
science and armed with technology, man has it within his power and
grasp to protect and preserve life, to promote and enhance human dignity
and human freedom. Perhaps the portrait of mankind in this new age
might well show Homo sapiens cradling in his right hand the miracle
drug penicillin to the glory of human life, and brandishing in his left hand
a fusion hydrogen bomb to the consummation in holocaust of human life
and its immolation on the altar of war. Man can indeed self-destruct. In
the great game of life as it is lived on this planet, man is not only a player
of the game, but also the cards that are played, and the stakes as well.
Scientists of varied disciplines: natural life, behavioral, and social scientists;
doctors of medicine and law; doctors of theology and philosophy;
educators; administrators of health and services; politicians; military
experts and interested citizens; all can contribute to a consensus that
mankind must arrive at. No one person, no one group, no one scientific
discipline can provide the answers. Solutions, like truth itself, will be
complex, sophisticated and inter-disciplinary, for there is no scientific
utopia on earth, nor a religious utopia, either. Such is the case precisely
because men, women, and children are by nature pilgrims seeking
answers, insights and wisdom in relation to nature’s deepest mystery and
most elusive secret: the gift of life.
In another context, what happens to man, to human life, to human
values in an autonomous technological society? Where science meets
the human person, what is the result? The problems are almost without
end. Some concern life itself and its dignity: abortion, contraception,
sterilization, experimentation on human beings, euthanasia and suicide;
others are connected with genetics: amniocentesis, genetic screening,
genetic engineering, in vitro fertilization and test-tube babies. There is
the matter of what patient gets access to the sophisticated, complicated
282
and expensive equipment; who receives the heart transplant, the cornea,
the kidney: Who gets access to the dialysis machine? There is the problem
of privacy and the threatened invasion of professional and medical
secrets, particularly through the use of computers and data banks; there
is the matter of free, informed consent to operations and experimentation.
These and many more problems demand the very best intelligence and
moral balance that a nation is capable of. By uncovering the secrets of the
genetic code, man has made himself capable of controlling and
manipulating man in a new dictatorship of tyranny and control through
biological engineering. The right to life, the quality of life, control of life,
human freedom and human dignity, all weigh in the balance in this brave
new world. Technology, too, with electronic achievements, has brought
an unheard of skill in the surveillance of man by fellow man: wire taps
and listening devices, computers and data banks, threaten to invade
man’s right to privacy, to erode his right to be left alone. But as ominous
a threat as this brave new world of science and technology is, yet it is, at
the same time, a world of great promise and almost infinite opportunity.
The harnessing of space outside man, the mastering of space inside of
man, offer maximum potential for the improvement of living conditions;
the care and cure of the sick and handicapped; the lightning of oppressive
physical labor, in a word, for the happiness of man on this mortal coil.
My hero is the Man: Homo. The world we now view from the literate
aspect: the vistas of time, the land and the seas, the heavenly bodies and
our own bodies, the plants and animals, history and human societies past
and present had to be opened for us by countless Columbuses. In the
deep recesses of the past, they remain anonymous. As we come closer to
the present they emerge into the light of history, a case of characters as
varied as human nature. Discoveries become episodes of biography,
unpredictable as the new worlds the discoverers opened to us. The
obstacles to discovery: the illusions of knowledge are also part of our
history. Only against the forgotten backdrop of the received common
sense and myths of their time can we begin to sense the courage, the
rashness, and the heroic and imaginative thrusts of the great discoverers.
They had to battle against the current ‘facts’ and dogmas of the learned.
Homo continues to recapture those illusions: about the Earth, the continents
and the seas before Columbus and Balboa, Megellan and Captain Cook,
about the heavens before Copernicus and Galileo and Kepler, about the
human body before Paracelsus and Vesalius and Harvey, about plants
and animals before Ray and Linnaeus, Darwin and Pasteur, about the past
283
before Petrarch and Winckelmann, Thomsen and Schliemann, about
wealth before Adam Smith and Keynes, about the physical world and the
atom before Newton and Dalton and Faraday, Clerk Maxwell and Einstein.
I have included here the story of only a few crucial sciences: cosmology,
biology, physics, geology and sociology which have been essential
instruments of human progress. I have not told the story of the shaping of
governments, the waging of wars, the rise and fall of empires. My focus
remains on mankind’s need to know: to know what is out there! Human story
is the story without end (religious sense). The most promising words ever
written on the maps of human knowledge are “terra incognita”: unknown
territory.
Is Science Value-Free?
Unfortunately, the tough-minded scientific perspective, like all
perspectives, has a negative side that its proponents do not always see.
In its concern to render all respectable knowledge value-free, it removes
virtually all historical, political, ethical, aesthetic, personal, legal, and
philosophical topics from the area of knowledge and deposits them in
the dustbin of personal opinion or even of illusion. For anyone concerned
with human values, value-free science is something to fear. Science without
values has the capacity, as religion by itself does not, of destroying the
world, of building bigger and better bombs, of inflicting more inventive
forms of cruelty on animals and humans in experimental technology, and
even of rejecting the search for truth itself in favor of technical mastery
and power. So, science should be driven by values: the values of truth,
compassion, and responsibility. And it should also be committed to
discovering values: the values of the intellectual beauty and rational
intelligibility of nature. But those statements, though they are of
tremendous importance, are neither publicly verifiable by any scientific
experiment nor universally agreed on. They are not statements of science.
They are statements of value that are embedded in the practice of “good”
science, but not, regrettably, of all science. From the perspective of toughminded science, such value statements are just matters of personal opinion
or decision. When such a sense is lost, science can become a mere means
to exploitation and greed, indifferent to the happiness of other creatures
and indifferent to the fate of future generations. It has happened to many
scientists, most notably in societies like Nazi Germany and communist
Russia, and it can easily happen again. It is, thus, vitally important that
scientists should have concern for truth, strong compassion for all sentient
284
beings, and a sense of responsibility for the welfare of the planet. Some
scientists complain that religion has no such concern, compassion, or
responsibility. This is a crude judgment, and we might just as easily
complain that a purely technological and truly value-free science has no
such concern either.
What should be said is that both religion and science need to be
moderated by morality, by the perception of value in experience. What
I am suggesting is that there are objective values, values that hold for
everyone and that are more than matters of personal choice and opinion
that can be apprehended in and through ordinary experience. The toughminded scientist will reject all such talk. There is nothing, such a scientist
will say, to apprehend. There is only our own decision and the purpose
we create for ourselves. Whatever their theoretical beliefs about the
objectivity of values, the best scientists have been driven by a passion for truth
at whatever cost. In pointing to the passion for truth and the faith in
intelligibility that mark good science, we have seen that it can be
reasonable and admirable to hold a passionate and morally grounded
belief that goes well beyond the available evidence. They have also
been driven by a passion for beauty, for intellectual elegance, and for
understanding. The equations of science may seem cool, purely rational,
and without feeling. But great scientists are people driven by passion for
truth. We admire the tenacity of Einstein who refused to give up belief in
determinism in the face of Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle. We may
even admire Daniel Dennett’s determination to avoid dualism at all costs or
Richard Dawkins’ refusal to read books of theology because he already knows
they are rubbish. Much will depend upon our own perspective. What is
certain is that there are few people who can live in the real world
refraining from believing anything unless they have theoretically
sufficient evidence for it. Human life is too short for that. The scientist is
driven by passion, but, science is not, after all, value-free.
The Relationship of Science and Unbelief
“Indeed it happens in many quarters and too often that there is no
proportion between scientific training and religious instruction: the former
continues and is extended until it reaches higher degrees, while the latter
remains at elementary level.” (John XXIII, Pacem in Terris, no. 153).
Science, with its partner technology, has had a most profound influence
on religion. Some scientific theories, moreover, have been destructive of
traditional beliefs, yielding a strong bias towards unbelief, religious
285
indifference, agnosticism, and atheism. With its marvelous achievements,
science has become the ‘miracle’ worker of the present dispensation,
able to explore the far-away planets and the internal DNA molecules,
producing lightning communications and wonder drugs. In somewhat
of a paradox, man is made the measure of all things, quasi-omnipotent, a
king in his own right, with no need of God or of transcendent moral
restraints; and at the same time deemed a mere machine reducible in
principle to the laws of physics and chemistry. Either way, the seeds of
unbelief have been sown down through the years. From the 18th century
has come Newton’s picture of man as machine and God as cosmic
clockmaker; from the 19 th century, Darwin’s new idea of evolving man
and divine immanence in a world of both chance and law; and from the
20 th century, the proposition that science must be considered more as a
method rather than as content. Many modern philosophers, influenced
by a positivism which extols science as the only norm for all discourse,
reject religion as having no cognitive claims, no basis in truth. Most, if not
all, scholars agree that the work of Newton (1687) in physics gave the
classical base for a conception of both nature and the nature of man.
Although a religious man and believer himself, yet he laid the foundation for
both determinism and materialism. Nature was pictured by Newton as a
closed, law-abiding machine; the cosmos was always predictable. Nature was
an intelligently designed machine, following fixed canons, man included. God
was the great clockmaker; and the world, once started, runs its course
predictably and inevitably. Scientists in the 18 th century consciously
adopted the model of “man as machine” as the fundamental mode of
understanding. This Newtonian paradigm was central to physics and
science in general for the next two centuries.
Thus man himself was predictable in principle, and freedom and
consciousness were “left-overs” from pre-scientific days. That this basic
notion perjures down through the centuries even to the present day may
be illustrated by the 1981 television series called “Cosmos,” featuring a
leading astronomer, Carl Sagan, who had become a celebrity known to
tens of millions as an attractive popularizer of science and its newest
discoveries, especially the space probes to the planets. Speaking to
millions he said: “I am a collection of water, calcium and organic molecules,
called Carl Sagan … but is that all? Some people find this idea somehow
demeaning to human dignity. For myself, I find it elevating: that our
universe permits the evolution of molecular machines, as intricate and
subtle as we are” ( Time, Oct. 20, 1980). The surprising fact is that this
286
Newtonian concept of man-as-machine survives to the present day, even
in spite of the advent of quantum physics which radically challenged
the classical notions. Matter was no longer described solely as made of solid
atoms and particles; there were electrons, X-rays, and radioactivity. Matter
was seen to take on the nature of both particles and waves; predictability
in significant measure was modified by the concept of probabilities, the
principle of indeterminacy. The classical description of reality has given
way to substantial modification, matter being seen to be more a sequence
of events rather than a mere collection of substances. All nature is in flux,
but always developing and constantly changing. All nature is a complex
of interesting forces in mutual interdependence. And finally, nature
includes man and his culture; thus the animal ancestry of man implied
that human culture could be analyzed in categories derived from biology.
Similarly, what is called “the New Religion” of socio-biology asserts
that biology will absorb social sciences, humanities, and religion because
all nature can now be seen to be reducible to genes, DNA, proteins and
enzymes. “The basic laws of physical sciences are consistent with the
laws of biological and social sciences, for this world has evolved from
other worlds obedient to these laws … science is the only avenue to the
understanding of reality” (E.O. Wilson, Harvard University., The New Religion,
1978). Darwin then gave “a preliminary (on the level of species) unifying
systematization” in the understanding of living systems. Today with the
discoveries in genetics, particularly of the DNA structures, scientists have
confirmed a new unity of nature, with no need to “depend on chance
events to generate mutations essential for unraveling genetic
phenomena.” It would seem fair to conclude that the science of biology and
its theory of evolution have become, for the modern mind, a world-view and
philosophy unto itself. As extrapolated by many scholars, it too rejects
both metaphysics and theology. Biology has been magnified into a
comprehensive science comprising not only all natural sciences but as
well all humanistic disciplines. Evolution has become a fundamental “law”
of the whole material and cosmic process and the history of human
culture, a philosophy rather than a scientific theory, and a firm base for
unbelief since God is unnecessary in this world-view. It is in this context
that the argument between evolutionists and creationists has been
revived. Creationists first try to paint science as a body of facts and
certainties. Yet they are the ones who constructed the straw man of
scientific infallibility in the first place.
287
Science as Method
A favorite thesis has it that people should know more about science
because many of the vital issues of the day have a scientific component:
think Global Warming, alternative energy, embryonic stem cell research,
missile defense, and biological warfare. Many scientists also argue that
members of the laity should have a better understanding of science so
they appreciate how important the scientific enterprise is to our planet’s
economic, cultural, medical, and military future. Our world is fast
becoming a technological Amazonia, they say, a pitiless pan-hemispheric
habitat in which being on a first-name basis with scientific and technical
principles may soon prove essential to one’s socioeconomic survival.
Science is huge, a great ocean of human experience; it’s the product and
point of having the most deeply corrugated brain of any species this
planet has spawned. Science is not a body of facts. Science is a state of mind,
it is a way of thinking. It is a way of viewing the world, of facing reality
square on but taking nothing on its face. Science is not a collection of
rigid dogmas, and what we call scientific truth is constantly being revised,
challenged and refined. It ’s irritating to hear people who hold
fundamentalist views accuse scientists of being the inflexible, rigid ones,
when usually it’s the other way around. As a scientist, you know that any
discovery you’re lucky enough to uncover will raise more questions than
you started with, and that you must always question what you thought
was correct and remind yourself how little you know. Science is a very
humble and humbling activity. Scientists accept, quite staunchly, that
there is a reality capable of being understood, and understood in ways
that can be shared with and agreed upon by others.
In both scientific and popular literature it has become commonplace
to contrast science and religion as to method. It is the pressure point
between the two, questioning the objectivity of each and its claim to
validity, reality, and ultimately of truth. In the 19 th century Darwin’s theory
of evolution encouraged new interpretations of divine immanence in
the cosmic process, as well as naturalistic philosophies of man’s place in
the world of law and chance. “But in the 20th century, the main influences
of science on religion have become less from specific theories, such as
quantum physics, relativity, astronomy, or molecular biology, than views
of science as method” (Barbour, Myths, Models and Paradigms). Science
is perceived as rendering knowledge upon which all men can agree
because it is objective, value-free, verifiable, both in content and method,
288
and of universal validity. Religion is characterized as subjective, more
emotive, of some use in society especially by way of personal
commitment. Being non-cognitive, religion can lay no claim to reality, or
to truth. Some would discount it further to the reductionist view that
religion is the product of the interior forces of human psychology or the
exterior forces of society. In the “Future of an Illusion” Freud described
religion in purely psychological terms as human projections in what could
be described as neurosis. Comte rejected metaphysics in favor of
positivist science. Sociology would in effect become just another form
of scientific knowledge verifiable by sense data.
Religious beliefs de facto do serve as the basis and motive for personal
identity and growth, as a creative force. Religion cannot be confined to
guilt, anxiety, and emotional responses, to the destructive effects of
maladjustments, to psychological responses, as Freud would have it.
Similarly, sociology can empirically investigate the functions of religion
and beliefs in society, authority and value structures without confining
religion to social functions, as Comte would have it. Yet the positivist
principle itself has proved too narrow, too purblind, even for sciences,
since it effectively excluded conclusive verification or proof of scientific
theories. Some modern scholars would see Descartes’ methodical or
systematic doubt as a truly scientific tool, somewhat inimical to religion
and belief based on revelation. Others would go further and espouse a
radical skepticism. Neither is intrinsic to science. Belief does not rule out
critical reflection nor a search for truth. But if science is perceived as
alone producing valid knowledge, and precisely because of its “objective”
methods, then the basis for unbelief is clearly laid. The second Vatican
Council (Gaudium et Spes, no. 57) recognized the problem involving method:
G a u d i u m e t S p e s ( V a tical I I )
Its first words were ‘The joy and the hope’, Gaudium et Spes ; and that is how it is
now referred to. Almost half a century later Gaudium et Spes still stands as a
major achievement of Vatican II, but the overall judgment of it by now is mixed.
Vatican II, for the people of my generation, remains a matter of vivid personal
recollection. The Pastoral Constitution, the Church in the Modern World ,
completed toward the end of the Council, launched the People of God into a new
confident expansive dialogue with the contemporary world. As we look back on
the last fifty years the joys have become more realistic, and the hopes even larger.
The event of Vatican II is still in progress, even if it could not have imagined how
the world would change. The pastoral constitution, it is commonly pointed out,
was in many ways a product of its time and that shows—not for the best either.
289
For these were the tumultuous, confused 1960s when Cultural Revolution had
entered the mainstream, including even the mainstream of the Church. Since
that beginning of Vatican II, a generation and a half (odd designation) has been
born. It has not known the Church of any other time. These younger people are
often puzzled by the longer memories and the seemingly strange loyalties of
their elders. They cannot imagine how an ecumenical council was a shock, what
the fuss was all about, how it was all experienced as challenge, a risk, or even a
defeat. A generation has died out, too. They were the wise ones when the council
began—influential Church leaders, brilliant theologians, the numerous members
of great religious orders, and the vast community of mature men and women
who had put a life into bringing up their children in the Catholic tradition. Now
these have gone; gathered out of this world of questioning and seeking and partial
evidence into the final mystery. Most went with hope, even greater hope than
ever before. But all went without yet seeing any great dream come true ... Some
went disillusioned and embittered over the number, the rapidity, and the depths
of the changes that were called for. Gaudium et Spes: “too much joy” and “too
much hope,” are still elusive indeed!
“No doubt today’s progress in science and technology can foster certain
exclusive emphasis on observable data, and an agnosticism above everything
else. For the methods of investigation, which these sciences use, can be
wrongly considered as the supreme rule for discovering the whole truth … Yet
the danger exists that man, confiding too much in modern discoveries, may
even think he is sufficient unto himself.”
Science is the Way to Transcendence
What is love without understanding? And what greater might do we
possess as human beings than our capacity to question and to learn?
Here comes the role of science. The more we learn about nature through
science, about the vastness of the universe and the awesome timescales
of cosmic evolution the more we will be uplifted. Most of the time, we
could not bring ourselves to overlook the scripture’s formulation of a flat,
six thousand year old earth, and we find especially tragic the notion that
we had been created separately from all other living things. The discovery
of our relatedness to all life was borne out by countless distinct and
compelling lines for evidence. For reasonable man, that life evolved
over the eons through natural selection was not just better science than
scriptures, it also afforded a deeper, more satisfying spiritual experience.
I believe that the little we do know about nature suggests that we know even
less about God. We had only managed to get an inkling of the grandeur of
290
the cosmos and its exquisite laws that guide the evolution of trillions if
not infinite numbers of worlds. However, we do not understand why anyone
would want to separate science, which is just a way of searching for what is
true, from what we hold sacred, which are those truths that inspire love and
awe. Our argument is not with God but with those who believed that our
understanding of the sacred had been completed. Science’s permanently
revolutionary conviction that the search for truth never ends seemed to
him the only approach with sufficient humility to be worthy of the
universe that it revealed. The methodology of science, with its error
correcting mechanism for keeping us honest in spite of our chronic
tendencies to project, to misunderstand, to deceive ourselves and others,
seemed to me the height of spiritual discipline.
The idea that the scientific method should be applied to the deepest
of questions is frequently decried as “scientism.” This charge is made by
those who hold that religious beliefs should be off limits to scientific
scrutiny, that beliefs (convictions without evidence that can be tested)
are a sufficient way of knowing. As Bertrand Russell puts it that “what is
wanted is not the will to believe, but the desire to find out, which is the
exact opposite.” We don’t want just to believe, on the other hand, we want to
know. Is it too much to ask? I want us to see ourselves not as the failed clay
of a disappointed creator, but as star-stuff, made of atoms forged in the
fiery hearts of distant stars. We were “star-stuff pondering the stars;
organized assemblages of 10 billion billion billion atoms considering the
evolution of atoms; tracing the long journey by which, here at last,
consciousness arose.” Our society is based on science and high
technology, but only a small minority among us has even a superficial
understanding of how they work, others left at the mercy of superstition.
What exactly is superstition? Is it just, as some have said that it is other
people’s religion? Or is there some standard by which we can detect
what constitutes superstition? For me, I would say that superstition is
marked not by its pretension to be a body of knowledge but by its
method of seeking truth. Superstition is merely belief without evidence. By
far the best way I know to engage the religious sensibility, the sense of
awe, is to look up on a clear night. I believe that it is very difficult to know
who we are until we understand where and when we are. I think everyone
in every culture has felt a sense of awe and wonder looking at the sky.
This is reflected the world in both science and religion. Thomas Carlyle
said that wonder is the basis of worship. And Albert Einstein said, “I
maintain that the cosmic religious feeling is the strongest and noblest
motive for scientific research.”
291
Ours is an age of faith, but not belief. People look for scientific evidence
for what they believe. There is a widespread search for an object worthy
of faith, and a healthy mistrust of that blind faith in leaders and causes
which has proved so disastrous in this century. The attraction of such
faiths is not that a goal worthy of a total commitment brings new
dimensions in life. Faith is a characteristic of our age, yet it is an age
without religious beliefs. In particular belief in god has disappeared, at
least as an effective element of contemporary living. It is therefore
tempting to suggest that religious faith might be presented today without
belief in god. But belief in god has always been regarded as an essential
part of every religious faith, and certainly the presupposition of religious
faith. That is what makes every sect a religion. It is not generally recognized
by religious people that while a man may choose to have faith, he cannot
choose belief. What we believe, about ourselves, our society, our world,
depends on the culture in which we are raised, and the adequacy of its
concepts and categories to interpret and explain our experience. Today’s
culture is dominated by science. Science is an effective medium to lead people
to transcendence. We may admire a man who decides to have faith in
someone or something. He believes in something, since this implies that
he is deliberately considering scientific evidence which would justify
such belief.
In a religious age men have religious beliefs: in a secular age they
have secular beliefs: in scientific age, they have scientific beliefs, that is,
they interpret and explain the world in its own terms. Ours is a secular
age and that is why in our time all religious beliefs have become
problematic, especially belief in god. And if belief in god is the
presupposition, the prior condition of a religion, then religious faith will
not be possible in our secular age. To demand faith is one thing, to require
belief is quite another, since changing our beliefs is not something that
can be brought about by an act of will. Many people don’t have faith in
what man says about faith. But they believe in a god whom no religions are
able to adequately offer. They have rightfully believe in the fallibility of
humans at the same time have the confidence of believing in a personal
and merciful god. The vast majority of people will still not be able to
interpret their experience as experience of god. And yet belief in god is
regarded as the prior condition of becoming a religious. Religion is not
as central to the life of the nation today as it used to be, but this is certainly
not because we are a nation incapable of faith. Today the systematic
religions find it hard to convince their believers, the validity of their faith, the
292
scriptures, the dogmas, the edicts, pujas and ceremonies are not enough. The
believer feels inadequate to take a leap of faith. It’s a scientific age. Hence,
modern believers need a vital source of confirmation from scientific
dimension. We are living in a strange universe. One of the outstanding
physicists of the twentieth century has said that the universe is not only
stranger than we imagine, but also stranger than we can imagine. It would
be desirable if we find the right key to the universe. We have tried various
combinations. We have not yet succeeded yet. It does not mean that we
are doomed. But only that we have to try again, more ingeniously, more
imaginatively, with more illuminating and deeper insights. The universe
is trying to tell us something. But so far we’re having trouble making out
just what it’s trying to say. Most of the times, science encounters
frustrations. When observation after observation agrees with our
predictions, it’s hard to move forward, but when an experimental result
flies in the face of our favorite theories, we begin getting somewhere. No
matter how good the theories are, they rarely encompass every
phenomenon we might hope to explain, our goal is to expand the reach
of our theories into the unknown, and nothing is more helpful in that
quest than a stubborn fact that refuses to fit the current picture.
Human beings are curious, resourceful, and creative. We shall try again
and again until we find a right idiom for cooperation with the universe. It
is important that we find a key to the whole story. The universe wants to
reveal itself to us. But we have been slow to answer its calling. We have
lived in a state of atrophy.5 This is not a right condition for the sparks of
the universe. We are the ambers of the energy of the universe, shining
particles of the light of the cosmos. Because the universe is us, it is
realizing itself through us. We are rediscovering light, while light is
rediscovering itself through us. To discover the universe anew, we need
to come much closer to it, and not be continually separated by alienating
scientific theories. We need to go much deeper to its underlying foundations,
and not be satisfied with the superficial physical surface of it. Sometimes,
however, we’re not so lucky. We have theories that, within their zone of
applicability, do a good job of explaining what we observe but leave us
with a nagging feeling that they’re not the final story. Our story of
creativity, universe, earth and evolution continually helping each other
5
Atrophy, wasting away of any bodily tissue, gland, or organ. Atrophy occurs at the
cellular level, and it involves either the death of individual cells or a loss of cellular health
and size. Poor blood circulation may contribute to cellular disease by denying cells the
nutrients that they need to thrive. Depending on its cause, atrophy may be either
temporary or permanent.
293
in the unfolding destiny of the cosmos is far from finished. It is time to
bring out transcendence to its full glory, as one of the cosmic forces shaping
the destiny of the world, in all spheres of existence, including human life. It is
through the force of transcendence that we can explain this relentless thrust
of our individual life to go forward. This imperative of transcendence is built
into the nature of the cosmos, as a kind of cosmic necessity. Transcendence is
a part of the nature’s evolution and of the cosmos itself. Transcendence,
creativity and evolution are not separate forces, each working on its own,
but parts of the cosmic team, helping each other and defining each
other. Transcendence has not only driven bacteria and lower forms of life
forward and upward, but has also been driving human beings to make
something of themselves far beyond what they were before. We cannot
understand our own life unless we accept that it is driven by something
much larger than our comfort and material satisfaction. There is something
inexorable in human life, which makes us continually go beyond all
previous accomplishments, that makes us transcend all previous stations.
This is felt in all human beings. Every ordinary humans grope for something
larger, long for wider horizons, which is exactly a response to this larger
call of the force of transcendence.
Once we accept transcendence, all is clear and coherent. It becomes
clear why artists are driven by the divine spark to go beyond; why early
forms of life were engaged in the sacred dance to transcend their early
limitations; why cosmic dust transformed itself into galaxies and then the
first molecules of life. There is something inexorable in the way the cosmos
has chosen to unfold. There are subtle balances in the composition of
matter, space and density : all regulated by what is sometimes
euphemistically called “cosmic constants.” 6 With the idea of
transcendence, we have the background through which we can explain:
this sense of the divine spark among artists which drives them on and on;
this sacred dance within the life forms; this awareness among humans
that they must go forward and upward. The omnipresent force of
transcendence could be conceived as a kind of vector, a sharply pointed
arrow, which drives the whole process. The vector of transcendence is
manifest in all the evolving stages of the cosmos, including our spiritual
The proper name for these “constants” and for all the propelling forces of the cosmos
is transcendence. If we do not postulate transcendence as a living force, then any sense
of self-perfectibility, any idea that life evolves and goes upward, is a complete enigma
and a mystery.
6
294
life. We should be really aware that the force that has driven the universe
through eons of time cannot be proven in a scientific laboratory in which
we screen blood tests for possible diseases. It cannot be proven in any
scientific laboratory.
The question of scientific proof is simply out of the question. We
have to have the courage of our simplicity and declare with Einstein that
we are seeking the simplest possible theory, which makes sense of the
manifest universe, including our own life in it. It is time that we connect
these deeper underlying currents, the forces which are invisible, but
which guide all visible phenomena. Evolution is a creative phenomenon.
But evolution has not worked by itself. Without the presence of
transcendence we would have not known the meaning of evolution. But
life has broken through so many of its limitations to flourish in ever new
forms. Transcendence is a wild force. Its energy is inexhaustible. For this
reason, it needed to be “tamed.” Hence, here comes the necessity of
creativity, which organizes the bursts of transcendence into distinctive
forms and patterns. The pursuit of evolution and of all evolved forms of
the universe is the pursuit of “structures”, through which the successive
dramas of the universe are played. Creativity is thus an exquisite artist,
which moulds and forms the energy of transcendence into structures of
coherence, which become structures of performance, of beauty, of
understanding. Therefore, the three realms, evolution, transcendence,
and creativity are not separate from each other, but overlap each other,
co-define each other.
Science should Reflect Religion
“For recent studies and findings of science, history, and philosophy raise
new questions which influence life and demand new theological
investigations.” (Vatican II, Gaudium et Spes, no. 62)
This new world promises to bring an end to the traditional Christendom
of past centuries, a world in which society was still based on the JudeoChristian understanding of reality. The Church looks to affirm not only
that God is not dead or irrelevant, but that God lives and is faithful. The
Church demonstrates that it too lives and is faithful in spite of adverse
currents of history on the children of science in any age or epoch. The
Church proclaims the dignity of man in the Incarnation and the
brotherhood of man in nature because of his creation by God. The Church
as well faces a great opportunity to penetrate the new insights into man
295
and creation; to cooperate with scientists, making clear its disinterested
concern for man, for his progress, and for him yet further to become
master of the mysteries of the natural world. The Church expresses its
belief that it never fears science and technology, and sees neither as
necessary threats to revealed religion, precisely because the Church
believes in the unity of all truth, God being its source. The Church
recognizes that scientists have their own competences. The Church welcomes
the advance and progress of science and technology but at the same time
refuses to baptize and accept every change as it occurs. The new world is
not to be opposed automatically, nor believers isolated in a religious
ghetto from it. Christians must stand in the mainstream of human life. But
it is necessary function to judge change from a moral and ethical vantage
point. The Church rejects modernism as a heresy of surrender, which has
seen the human face of the Church but has misconceived her divine
nature” (Suhard). At the same time, it rejects integralism, the heresy which
makes the Church, of its transcendence, an out-of-this-world or otherworldly community divorced from God’s own creation, divorced from
history, divorced from the incarnation. The Church’s role is to save the
world, not to conquer it.
In our age, many young men and women, more than ever before,
have been afforded the advantages of a systematic education that has
opened their minds to a vast array of facts and notions about themselves
and the physical world they live in. However, a characteristic of
contemporary education is the stress on experiential knowledge and the
scientific method of investigation and verification which is touted as the
only legitimate way of attaining truth. It is an immanentistic stance that
tends to reduce all reality to that which can be perceived by the senses,
measured and quantified. In other words, it leaves no space for a reality
that transcends the material cosmos, no space for investigating the
primary cause and ultimate purpose of all created things. Generations
have been brought up to regard scientific and religious views of reality as
irreconcilable and mutually exclusive, or at most, as views of two distinct
realities analogically defined: one objective, the other subjective. Actually,
at this point of scientific advancement, relatively few responsible
scientists cling to that rationalistic position, and yet in the political arena,
in many halls of learning and in the communications media, the
irreconcilability of the two views is still a recurring cliché relied on to
undermine the influence of religion or of church authority wherever it
conflicts with the power tactics of a particular party or ideology. On the
296
other hand, it is contended that the amazing pace of scientific discovery
and technological sophistication, with all their undeniable benefits for
the human race, has left theological reflection in the lee with many a
question unanswered in terms of moral or ethical value judgments.
In terms of achievement, science has immensely broadened our
understanding of the universe, the macrocosm and the microcosm. It has
devised techniques and instruments to probe the farthest reaches of
outer space and the tiniest components of the atom. It has measured and
harnessed nature’s dynamic forces and bent them to the service of
humanity, its needs, its comforts and also its ambitions, for better or for
worse! It has become clear that, in the process, scientists have acquired
the power to tamper with nature’s built-in balances and, in some
memorable instances, have triggered mechanisms of wide-scale
destruction. Today all eyes are fixed on the fingers which could trigger a
world holocaust, and minds are searching wildly for a compelling force
that could effectively stay such a dastardly impulse and insure our survival.
Apart from that extreme eventuality, there are many other areas in which
science and technology are treading on dangerous ground. They have
acquired the tolls for wreaking irreparable mischief, and scientists
themselves of their own making which they cannot control. A fundamental
need for our times is a truly human perspective that will take into account
the meaning and purpose of human life, its origin and destiny which
give it unique dignity and sacredness. Without this perspective, nothing
is secure, anything goes. The dimming of this perspective explains why
it is that certain scientists pursue their goals regardless of the process
which ultimately reduces human beings to the level of mere machines,
to be “manufactured” according to specific standards for specific
purposes, to be discarded if they are defective or unproductive. Believers
in God recognize the capacity and achievements of science; many have
played significant roles in its advancement, but they also know that the
human race cannot survive without a respect for the fundamental values of
life. The judgment that moral reasoning has not kept pace with the rapid
advances of science and technology has prompted church leaders to
foster a dialogue between religion and science. Many great scientists
were and are indeed believers, but for some of them, their religious faith
and their scientific knowledge belong to different levels of understanding
and are not logically correlated. It is with a view to integrate and unify
that which is perceived as separate and dissociated that the church in
particular has undertaken to foster dialogue with the world of science.
297
Into the last two decades of the 20th century, men and women carry
and support a cultural heritage deeply informed and permeated
profoundly by science and its daughter, technology. This scientific
inheritance has been basically quite congenial to unbelief, and as well
quite destructive of traditional religious belief and faith. Man was made
the measure of all things, his progress and indeed perfectibility inevitable
and inexorable with the force of evolution; his origins explicable, his
future to be secure, given time. He was desacramentalized, even as his
body lost its sacramentality, its nature as something sacred. Newton and
Darwin, Hume and Comte, Marx and Freud, as well as their popularizers
Huxley and Sagan, laid premises for modern denials of man as a creature
made to the image and likeness of God. With the rejection of metaphysics,
the floodgates were open to theories and hypotheses, more or less
plausible, that laid the foundations for the erosion of the intrinsic dignity
and worth of each man, woman, and child, born or unborn. Bodily integrity
itself is imperiled. Yet this heritage has not been homogeneous by any
means. Twentieth century man has lived in the bloodiest of centuries. The
century with wars and exquisite tyrannies, made possible in large measure
by science and technology in the hands of “perfectible man,” has made
men and women raise questions that look to a moral order, to further
judgment where applied science touches the human race. Science has
not produced either, the utopia promised, nor the liberation predicted
so confidently in the name of evolutionary progress. Even scientists, in
two very notable circumstances and predicaments, called for ethical
considerations over and above the scientific.
The first happened, when President Truman was deciding to drop the
first atom bomb on Japan; the second, when DNA was discovered and its
potential dangers surmised. On both occasions, leading scientists
questioned the morality of what was contemplated. For the first time in
history, the USA scientists agreed to the voluntary moratorium on DNA
research, joined by British men and women of science. Moreover, the
new sciences are not uncritically accepted by the men and women of
today, conditioned by the disappointments of recent history. The potential
for good in nuclear energy is countered by the menace of bombs and
warfare of cataclysmic proportions, if not simply by radio-active
poisoning. The blessings of the genetic and biomedical revolutions are
tempered by the horrible manipulations and gross experimentations that
are reducing human beings to utterly expendable things, objects, brute
matter. The “Gospel of Progress” clearly needs a new hermeneutic and
298
exegesis. Modern men and women do not naively accept the “miracles”
of science and technology, even though deeply influenced by them.
The electronic revolution with all pervasive television and computer,
extending more and more towards every household in the world; the
genetic revolution with the promises of recombinant DNA, are all
received with something of a sophistication lacking in the previous
centuries. Men and women of the last two decades of the 20 th century
simply do not accept the notion, sown in early days, of the inevitability of
progress in the human race. History has been a hard task-master in this
century. The reasons are not far to seek: “When a divine substructure and
the hope of eternal life are wanting, man’s dignity is most lacerated, as
current events often attest. The riddles of life and death, of guilt and
grief, go unsolved, with the frequent result that men succumb to despair.
Meanwhile, every man remains to himself an unsolved puzzle …
especially when life’s major events take place” (Gaudium et Spes, no.
21).
Science has indeed laid the groundwork for unbelief, religious
indifference, agnosticism, and atheism, perhaps more indirectly than
commonly thought. Yet unbelief shows much more direct correlation
with factors other than science. The presence of evil in the world, the
precepts of a moral law, especially in reference to sexual morality
including marriage, divorce, contraception, abortion, pornography, etc.;
the secularization of social, educational and political structures; a general
moral decline with world wide terrorism and materialism; the autonomy
of various disciplines, are seen to correlate more positively with unbelief
than science and technology. This climate which encourages religious
indifference has been dubbed neo-paganism of a somewhat Nietzschean
hue 7 affecting morality and ‘clearing the way for a return to pagan
naturalism … fomenting the secularizing of moral standards … (for) when
you do not live the way you think, you end up thinking the way you live”
(Archbishop Poupard, Fifth Synod of Bishops, Oct. 1980). The research is
not at all conclusive, however, perhaps there is a much greater influence
than the scientists and the public-at-large perceive. It seems probable at
least, that science and technology have exerted their influential pressures
through the very factors themselves such as secularization and morality. Lifestyle and the like, and thereby contribute indirectly through them to a
fostering of unbelief and agnosticism. The testimony of scholars and
7
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), German philosopher, poet, and classical philologist,
who was one of the most provocative and influential thinkers of the 19th century.
299
experts would suggest even a more direct relationship; the research data
would mitigate their judgment. There is no necessary relationship
between science and unbelief; nor scientific methods. Over the years
science, while congenial to agnosticism, has seen itself co-opted for
purposes and ends decidedly un-scientific, whether for social, political,
economic, or ideological purposes. Science is not as objective, value-free
and as disinterested as some theologians postulate; and religion is not as
subjective, value-laden, and passionate as some scientists might assume.
Both can be true as well as useful to mankind since they share a common
source, namely, God.
Invention and Technology
Our professors told us variously that technology was the application
of science; that it was the study of the machinery and methods used in
the economy; that it was society’s knowledge of industrial processes;
that it was engineering practice. But none of these seemed satisfactory.
Now, I realize that new technologies were not “inventions” that came
from nowhere. All the examples I was looking at were created, constructed,
put together, and assembled from previously existing technologies.
Technologies in other words consisted of other technologies. On the
other hand, the jet engine does not arise from the cumulation of small
changes of previous engines favored by natural selection. Nor does it
arise by simple combination, throwing existing pieces together in some
jumbled fashion mentally or physically. We are really asking how invention
happens? And strangely, given its importance, there is no satisfying
answer to this in modern thinking about technology. And so, today
invention occupies a place in technology like that of “mind” or
“consciousness” in psychology; people are willing to talk about it but not
really to explain what it is? Textbooks mention it, but hurry past it quickly
to avoid explaining how it works.
Invention falls into two broad patterns. It may start from one end of the
chain, from a given purpose or need, and find a principle to accomplish this.
Or, it may start from the other end, from a phenomenon or effect, usually a
newly discovered one, and envisage in it some principle use. In either pattern
the process is not complete until the principle is translated into working
parts. These two patterns overlap a great deal, so there is no need to
describe both in detail. I will explore the process of invention mainly
when it starts from a perceived need. Invention starts from a purpose, to
find the solution to some perceived need. The need may arise from an
300
economic opportunity, the recognition of a potentially lucrative market
perhaps; or from a change in economic circumstances; or from a social
challenge; or from a military one. Often the need arises not from an outside
stimulus, but from within technology itself. In the 1920s, aircraft designers
realized they could achieve more speed in the thinner air at high altitudes.
But at these altitudes reciprocating engines, even when supercharged
with air pumped up in pressure, had trouble drawing sufficient oxygen,
and propellers had less “bite.” Needed was a different principle from the
piston-propeller one. Typically such a need sits for some time with at
least some practitioners aware of it, but with none seeing an evident
solution. If there were one, standard technology would suffice. The
question is therefore by definition challenging. Those that do take up the
challenge may encounter the situation as a need to be fulfilled or a
limitation to be overcome, but they quickly reduce it to a set of
requirements, a technical problem to be solved.
The originators of the jet engine, Frank Whittle and Hans von Ohain,
were both aware of the limitations of the old piston-and-propelled
principle and of the need for a different one. But they re-expressed these
as a technical problem, a set of requirements to be met. Whittle sought a
power unit that was light and efficient, could compensate for the thin air
at high altitudes, and could if possible dispense with the propeller. And
von Ohain sought a “steady aerothermodynamic flow process,” noting that
“the air ducted into such a system could be decelerated prior to reaching
and Mach-number sensitive engine component.” The need becomes a
well-specified problem. The problem now comes forward as it were,
looking to meet an appropriate solution. Newton commented famously
that he had come upon his theory of gravitational orbits “by thinking on
it continuously.” This continuous thinking allows the subconscious to work,
possibly to recall an effect or concept from past experience, and it
provides a subconscious alertness so that when a candidate principle or
a different way to define the problem suggests itself the whisper at the
door is heard. What is being sought at this stage is not a full design. What
is being sought, as I said earlier, is a base concept; the idea of some effect
in action that will fulfill the requirements of the problem, along with
some conception of the means to achieve this.
Branches of Science
Our view of the nature of the universe and of the place of humans
within it has changed completely within the last century from anything
301
that could have been imagined in the past. Discoveries in cosmology
and evolutionary biology, in computer science and solid-state physics
have revolutionized human thinking in fundamental ways. It would be
absurd to insist that ancient religious beliefs should remain unchanged when
our whole view of the universe has changed radically. But that thought raises
the question of whether religious beliefs can survive at all in the scientific
age. Have they been resoundingly outdated? Or is there in them
something of great importance, even though the way they are expressed
will have to change in the new scientific context? To put it very briefly,
there is a nonphysical reality that is of supreme value and that humans
can become aware of it through various forms of prayer and meditation.
Science will not resolve these deep existential struggles. But science
can help to dispel ignorance about the universe and bring some clarity
about the relation of the objective supreme value postulated by religion
to the observed nature of the physical universe. Many of the greatest
natural scientists have seen their investigations as ways of seeking to
understand the wisdom and glory of God in nature. But some scientists
and philosophers have argued that only the methods of science can
reveal truth about the universe and that religion is intrinsically
antiscientific and superstitious. So science has been used both as a
support for religion and as a way of undermining religion. That ambiguity
remains and must be reflected in any fair treatment of science and
religion.
Physics
Physics is one of those modest disciplines that the study of what the
world is made of, how it works, and why things in the world behave the
way they do and understanding something complex in terms of its
constituent parts. Sometimes in modern physics a more sophisticated
approach is taken that incorporates elements of the listed above; it relates
to the laws of symmetry and conservation, such as those pertaining to
energy, momentum, charge, and parity. Physics is the science of starter
parts and basic forces, and thus it holds, the answers to many basic
questions. Why is the sky blue? Why do you get a shock when you trudge
across a carpeted room and touch a metal door-knob? Why does a white
T-shirt keep you cooler in the sun than a black one, even though the
black one is so much more slimming? Physics is the foundation on which
chemistry and biology are built. Physics, then, is the pylon science, the
discipline on which the others are piled, if sometimes peevishly. We are
302
a component of physics and cosmology. Hence, we are the universe, and
by studying the universe we ultimately turn the mirror on ourselves. Science
is not describing a universe out there, and we’re separate entities. We’re
part of that universe. We’re made of the same stuff as that universe, of
ingredients that behave according to the same laws as they do elsewhere
in the universe. To say that there is an objective reality, and that it exists
and can be understood, is one of those plain-truth poems of science that
is nearly bottomless in its beauty. It is easy to forget that there is an
objective, concrete universe, an outer-verse measured in light years.
We are made of stardust; why not take a few moments to look up at
the family album? Most of the time, when people walk outside at night
and see the stars, it’s a big, pretty background. The world out there, over
your head and under your nose, it is real and it is knowable. To understand
something about why a thing is as it is in no way can detract from its
beauty and grandeur, nor does it reduce the observed to ‘just a bunch of’
chemicals, molecules, equations, specimens for a microscope. Scientists
get annoyed at the hackneyed notion that their pursuit of knowledge
diminishes the mystery or art or ‘holiness’ of life. Immanuel Kant observed
that ‘the most astonishing thing about the universe is that it can be
understood.’ That all matter is built of atoms is one of those profound
insights into the nature of reality that gestated in larval, largely figmental
form for some two thousand years, before twentieth-century physicists
like Albert Einstein and Niles Bohr finally offered experimental evidence
of atom’s existence. The Greek philosopher Democritus argued circa 400
B.C. that everything was made of invisible, indivisible particles, which
varied in shape, size, and position and which could be mixed and matched
to yield every manner of matter. Democritus called these particles
“atomos”, meaning “unbreakable” or “uncuttable.” Aristotle insisted that
the world was composed, not of discrete particles, but of four essences
or qualities: earth, fire, air, and water. Everything, every single thing
deserving of the designation “thing”, is made of atoms. Even, the brain
cells that give rise to your thoughts are all built of atoms and if one
thought triggers another it does so via the transmission of neurochemicals
along synaptic pathways in your brain, which again are vast assemblages
of atoms. Thanks to the modern science, we know the secret life and
influence of atoms on everything in the universe. The whole universe is a
dance of atoms. Like people, atoms have their own way of dancing and
characteristics.
303
Atoms may and often do attract each other. Atoms form bonds, usually
by sharing electrons consigned to each participant atom’s outermost
orbit. Through the artful bartering of electrons along their frontiers, two
hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom conjoin to form a molecule of
water. But, importantly, the atoms do not merge, or invade one another’s
comparatively vast expanse of empty inner space. The atoms remain
discrete entities, distinct particles composed of protons and neutrons in
the nucleus, a huge amount of hollow space, and a cloud cover of
electrons located far, far from the nucleus. The hollow space is, as a rule,
a sacred place. Neither the electron clouds nor the nuclear particles of
one atom will penetrate the inner void of another atom. Only under
extraordinary conditions, as in the high-pressure furnace of the interior of
a star, can two atoms be squashed together, at which reaction their nuclei
combine to form a new, heavier type of atom, another element further
along the periodic scale. Most of the time atoms always maintain their
autonomy and ethnic identity, including when they are in a stable
molecular relationship with other atoms. The hydrogen and oxygen atoms
with which the oceans are filled remain hydrogen and oxygen to their
core and can be plucked free from one another, although it takes energy
to cleave the bonds of a water molecule or any other molecule and
isolate the constituents.
Electrons are extremely tiny. They have mass, but the amount is so
modest that they can sometimes behave almost like photons, the massless
particles that carry light. Moreover, as far as we know, electrons are
elementary particles, meaning they can’t be broken down into even
smaller particles. Scientists can crack apart the nuclear particles, the protons
and neutrons, into even smaller subnuclear particles, called quarks. But no
matter how they have slammed and squeezed electrons in the brutal
conditions of a high-energy particle accelerator, they have not found
subelectronic components inside. Dry air is an abysmal conductor of
electrons. The reason why static cling and shocking handshakes are a
particular problem in winter is that indoor, heated air tends to be extremely
dry. Thus, any charged particles you may have gathered on your person
by walking across a carpeted room or removing an overcoat will likely
remain on your person unless or until they have somewhere else to go.
They’ll tug remaining layers of clothes together, or they’ll jump from you
to the proffered hand of a newcomer, especially if that person is wearing
a metal ring. In that single shocking moment, about a trillion electrons
typically leap to their new host, bringing the donor back to the near
304
neutrality that usually characterizes the human body. You’ve probably
heard about the four fundamental forces, and you might know them by
name: electromagnetism, gravity, the strong force, and the weak force. We
live in a world of four fundamental forces. A fundamental force is best
thought of as a fundamental interaction, a relationship between two
chunks of matter. It turns out that there are just four known ways that one
piece of matter can communicate with another, four approaches to
acknowledging the existence of a body other than one’s own. Each of
these interactions differs in strength and range, operates according to a
distinct set of rules, and yields distinct results. Physicists propose that the
four forces are really four manifestations of a single underlying superforce, and that when our universe was young, firm, and hot, the forces
behaved as one.
Astronomy - Cosmology
Astronomy is so easy to love. It is filled with outrageous magic that
also happens to be true: novas, supernovas and hyper-novas and pulsar
stars that spin and click and are as thick as an atomic heart, and those
thicker, darker collapsed star carcasses we call black holes, which are so
dense that even light cannot escape their gravitational grip; and quasars,
celestial furnaces at the edge of the known universe that are the size of
stars but as luminous as entire galaxies. Astronomy is about heavens, the
divinest of final frontiers and the presumed zip code of Ra, Vishnu, Zeus,
Odin, Tezcatlipoca, Yahweh, Our Father Who Art In, and a host of other
holy hosts; and that religious resonance markedly broadens the discipline’s
appeal, making it feel both cozier and more profound than it might
otherwise. Astronomy also seems chaster than other sciences, purer of
heart and freer of impurities, mutagens, teratogens, animal testing. Fairly
or not, physics is associated with nuclear bombs and nuclear waste,
chemistry with pesticides, biology with Frankenfood and designer-gene
superbabies. But astronomers are like responsible ecotourists, squinting
at the scenery through high-quality optical devices, taking nothing but
images that may be computer-enhanced for public distribution, leaving
nothing but a few Land Rover footprints on faraway Martian soil.
Astronomers are pure of heart and appealingly puerile. They look into
the midnight sky and ask big questions, just as we did when we were in
college: who are we? Where do we come from? By surveying the skies
with instruments turned to every possible wavelength of light,
astronomers get a sense of what sort of cosmic bestiary we live in. Infrared
telescopes can peer through the thick dust clouds that serve as a galaxy’s
305
stellar nursery and detect signals from embryonic stars within. Ultraviolet
studies illuminate the nature of hot young massive stars, cool old dwarf
stars, active galaxies, and hyperactive quasars. With X-ray and gammaray scans, scientists have probed black holes, pulsars, supernovas, and
the mysterious gamma-ray bursters, thought to be an unusually violent
class of exploding stars. Radio-waves murmur hoarsely of the big bang
from which all else sprang. Truly, there wasn’t really a bang. A bang is a
sound, and sound waves need air molecules to propagate, and in the
beginning not only was there no air there, there were no molecules,
either, or atoms, just pure energy. The expanding universe is not that
different from an expanding balloon, except that the universe is bigger,
colder, and darker. Their spectacular velocity is spectacular only to us,
while to one another they are cruising along at unremarkable speeds. As
Albert Einstein demonstrated in his special theory of relativity, it is
meaningless to speak of an object’s absolute speed or motion through
space, for there is no final arbiter, no unchanging, eternal grid against
which that speed can be clocked. All you can ask is “fast compared to
what?” from our perspective, we and our nearby galaxies are moving through
space at about 370 miles, or 590 kilometers, per second. By contrast, the
most distant galaxies seem to be receding from us at velocities of
thousands of tens of thousands of miles per second. The gaseous nebula
from which our solar system formed very likely had been enriched several
times over with star stuff, with the luxurious carnage of multiple supernovas
that had exploded nearby over the course of the last 10 billion years.
Each round of enrichment had enhanced the chance that the cloud at
last would cool, and swirl, and condense into a skirted star, and the skirt
would prove elementally weighty enough to yield the rocky, complex
inner planets on which life could make a deal.
Future Space
For many people space tourism and even colonisation are attractive ideas. But in
order for these to start we need vehicles that will take us to orbit and bring us
back. Current space vehicles clearly cannot. Beyond the year 2020, radically
different types of rockets will be required to serve a new function: to carry out
long-haul interplanetary missions in deep space, including servicing a robot base
on the moon, probing the asteroid belt and comets, and even supplying a manned
base on Mars. By then, missions to the planets will become routine. What is needed
is a cheap and reliable means of transport. Several competing designs have been
proposed to power the rockets of the future, including the ion engine, the nuclear
rocket, the rail gun, and the solar sail. Many of them suffer from major drawbacks.
306
Physicist Freeman Dyson has said, “I declare solar-electric (ion) propulsion to be
the winner in space because it allows us to push as far in the directions of speed,
efficiency, and economy as the laws of physics allow.” Our twentieth century
chemical rockets and next generation of ion engine rockets are analogous to the
tortoise and the hare. Chemical rockets, like the hare, are fine for rapidly blasting
out of the earth’s gravitational field, but they exhaust fuel so rapidly that they
can be turned on for only a few minutes. Ion engines, like the turtle, are able to go
long distances because their small but steady acceleration can be maintained
for years.
Astrobiology - We are not Alone!
After a million or so years of breathless expansion driven by the big
bang’s phenomenal outward-bound pressure, gravity began to exert a
moderating counterforce. Stars are born. The source of star’s energy, its
shine, its heat, its guiding wish-worthy light, is thermonuclear fusion, the
perpetual merging at the dense stellar core of large numbers of small
atoms into a smaller number of larger atoms. The power of nuclear fusion
is the defining hallmark of a star, and it takes a certain heft and density to
pull it off. Jupiter is a very big ball of gas, but it’s not quite big enough.
The atoms at its core are not under sufficient pressure to change their
elemental identity. Only at a mass about eighty times greater than Jupiter’s
will a ball of gas have the stoutness of heart to accomplish thermonuclear
fusion, the squeezing together of reluctant singleton nuclei into the
radiance of atomic matrimony. The first stars to condense out of the primal
nebula, though, were likely much bigger than eighty Jupiters, or even
eight hundred suns, for as they began their collapse, the compaction
through gravity of a thick slub of gas into a tidier and more coherent
sphere, the increasingly dense object would attract even more matter
from its dusty surroundings and so grow huge rapidly by accretion. The
early universe was a cramped, cluttered, dusty, gaseous place compared
to today, and so a condensing ball had no choice but to pull in huge
hanks of extra matter as it tightened in on itself, to augment its mass even
as its volume diminished. That hugeness exacted a high personal cost:
giant stars die young and violently. Our exemplar star is an enormous
condensation of hydrogen, hundreds of times more massive than the
sun, and the electrons have been stripped from their protons, and all is a
plasmic bisque. Gravity is tugging everything inward, toward an
imaginary point at the center, and so the pileup of hydrogen particles is
greater the more deeply you delve.
307
At the superhot, high-pressure confines of the core, the hydrogen
nuclei are swirled and squeezed, swirled and squeezed, until a critical
threshold is surmounted, electromagnetic repulsion is defeated, and
discrete hydrogen particles are fused into helium nuclei. The energy
liberated by this thermonuclear fusion begins radiating outward, from
the core toward the surface, and the billowing up of heat and light offers
a counterbalance to the inward pull of gravity. In fact, the pulsing radiation,
the bounty of fusion, is what keeps the star intact, keeps its inner layers
from collapsing under the weight of those on top. Our sun, for example,
fuses 700 million tons of hydrogen into helium every second, and in so doing
radiates away pieces of itself each day, splashing warmth and light across
the solar system. Yet even though the sun has burned for 5 billion years, and
even as it grows gaunter with every passing moment, it has enough hydrogen,
packaged with just the right degree of density, to stay lit for another 5 billion
years. And star dies, our star explodes as a supernova, and in those furious
closing moments of its life, the real heavyweights of the elemental table
are forged, platinum, thallium, bismuth, lead, tungsten, gold. The newborn
par ticles are scattered into space, along with the many other,
comparatively lighter elements that the star belly had built up before
the whole star went belly-up. The metal particles bequeathed by the
progenitor stars cooled the gaseous landscape enough for a multitude
of nebulous eddies to begin condensing into stars. So, it likely was with
our solar system. Some 5 billion years ago, the shock waves of an
exploding supernova and the concomitant expulsion of the star’s
salubrious heavy elements into interstellar space spurred a ragged cloud
of gas and dust in one of the Milky Way’s arms to begin condensing. As it
contracted, the nebula began to spin and flatten into a disk. Through
several million gyrating years, the bulk of the mass was drawn by gravity
toward the center of the pancake, forming a bulge of ever escalating
heat and density, which finally burst into thermonuclear splendor. The
matter remained around our newborn sun, became proto-planets and
proto-moons.
We know we have intelligent life on earth. Are there other beings, on
other worlds, and will we ever be able to contact them, or they us? Are
we alone, or one of millions of habited planets in the galaxy, or billions in
the universe? Is there any evidence one way or the other for
extraterrestrial life? The bad news is, no, we can’t yet contact any
extraterrestrial beings. However, great majority of astronomers believe there
is life on other planets. Some think that life is common, that the universe is
308
flooded with star stuff stuffed into self-replicating organisms of more or
less cellular-based structures. Others say that life is likely to be rare, but
that nonetheless it’s probably not limited to earth. To me the answer is
easy and obvious. Our sun is one star out of hundreds of billions of stars in
our galaxy, and the Milky Way is just one out of billions and billions of
galaxies. It’s just impossible that we are the only life in the universe. I’m
inclined to think that life is very common in the universe. Not only are there
billions of stars, astronomers say, billions of solar ovens radiating photonic
comestibles that practically beg to be eaten, but there are likely to be
billions of planets circling those stars, billions of possible tables where
one might find organisms that take in nutrients, excrete waste, and
replicate. Planetary formation, it seems, is a frequent byproduct of stellar
condensation, the planetary disk forming as a result of the angular
momentum of a collapsing, spinning star. Many astronomers are now
searching for signs of extra-solar planets by checking for wobbles or
irregularities in a star’s motions, which may signal that it has gravitational
companions, or the intermittent dimming of a star’s light would result
whenever an orbiting planet passed between the star and us. More
recently, they have detected signs of smaller and possibly earthier worlds,
tracing orbits at sensibly temperate distances from their parent sun.
Astronomers also find comfort in how relatively quickly life arose on
earth after the crust had cooled, and the unshakable conviction with
which life has stood its ground ever since. They point to recent work in
the field of nanotechnology, the chemistry of materials constructed on
extremely small scales, showing that carbon molecules spontaneously
form rings, tubes, and spheres, the very sort of skeletal structures on
which life is draped. Carbon is a common constituent of supernova shrapnel,
they say, and if carbon so readily self-assembles into the precursors of
biomolecules, the rise of life may be virtually inevitable if carbon finds itself
self-assembling in certain settings, for example, on a planet with liquid water
to its credit. Again, it is not an outrageous demand. Water, like carbon, is
commonplace, and though most of the cosmic quotient of water looks to
be in gaseous or frozen form, there are sure to be other liquid oases in the
vast sample space that is outer space. Here on earth, anywhere you find
liquid water, you find life. Life is remarkably robust when it comes to
adapting to extremely cold or hot water, or very acidic water. It’s hard to
imagine, given the robustness of microbial life, that if there’s liquid water
somewhere else, life hasn’t found a way to take advantage of it. On the
question of how complex any of that extraterrestrial life may be, and
whether there are other technologically sophisticated civilizations with
309
whom we in theory could communicate. When you start asking, what is
the probability that life, once it has developed, will evolve something
sufficiently intelligent that it tries to communicate and travel around,
well, I have to say “ … mmm … Yes.”
Nevertheless, a few resilient souls have sought to do exactly that.
Most famously, Frank Drake, then a Cornell astronomer and a founder of
the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence initiative, or SETI, 8 in the 1960s
offered his methodical approach to calculating how many
“communicative societies” may be out there in the Milk y Way, a
formulation now known as the Drake Equation.9 Drake takes consists of
seven variables to consider, proceeding from such comparatively
straightforward factors as the rate of new star formation and the number
of stars likely to have planets, and progressing into ever softer and more
subjective terrain, including: the odds that a particular life-bearing locale
will give rise to intelligent life; that the intelligence will be of a tinkering,
toolmaking type; and, finally, that the technologically adroit civilization,
having reached the point where it is capable of sending its halloos our
way, will persist long enough to hear our reply. If the life span of an
advanced civilization is long with millions of years, then the probability
of another intelligent civilization coexisting with us becomes high. Our
civilization has recently, by systematic manipulation of genes, has
extended the life span of humans. In future, humans can live couple of
hundred years, like sea turtles. The civilizations, that have learnt to
manipulate the longevity of life, could still live out there. There is a possibility
that some civilizations that have equipped with technology to outlive redgiants, white dwarfs, supernovas, galaxy collisions, and even big crunch, might
still exist well beyond 10 billion years. Other civilizations might have come
and gone before us and new ones may be in the process of forming, but
by the time they do we’ll have destroyed ourselves or we’ll develop a
technology that could allow us to dodge all the astronomical harassments.
8
Search for extraterrestrials: a scientific attempt to detect or communicate with
intelligent beings from beyond Earth, especially using radio signals. Full form for SETI is
search for extraterrestrial intelligence.
9
An intelligent, communicating civilization might be much easier to detect than
primitive life, because it might produce signals such as radio waves, that could be much
more powerful than even natural light from a star. To calculate that likelihood that
intelligent life could be detected elsewhere in the galaxy, American astronomer Frank
Drake developed an equation for the number of communicating civilizations that might
exist.
310
Even though religions believe that this world has been created by
God, sometimes the presence of evil in the world strongly suggests some
kind of tampering with the creation of the universe. As we’ve seen that
some 10 billions years ago, without doubt, the universe gave birth to
stars and planets. Astronomers are discovering new planets at a prodigious
rate: these are the most likely to be inhabited. Same chemical processes
might betray its activity. We can be almost sure that life, completely
independent of our own, which has followed its own evolutionary course
for billions of years, would be anything like us or may not be like us. What
makes us think it would be carbon-based and living in water and not
built from completely different molecules and employing an exotic
biochemistry? Other than photosynthesis, what other sources of energy
might alien life capitalize on? Could photosynthesis be a common trick
for life, soaking up the light of suns throughout the galaxy? Oxygen
released by photosynthesis (Photosynthesis literally means ‘building with
light’) has built up to a high level in the earth’s atmosphere and such a
feature may also indicate the existence of similar life on distant planets, a
signature we could detect light years away. The evolution of oxygenreleasing photosynthesis also produced one of the most profound
changes in the history of the earth.
The study of this sort is known as astrobiology. It is the search for
potential niches for life, both within our solar system and throughout the
galaxy. As with any science, hypotheses are postulated, experiments
constructed, theories refined according to the data and improved
experiments designed. Astrobiology can point to no specific inception
but has gradually gathered momentum and acceptance over the last
fifty years, as discoveries within biology and space exploration show
that extra-terrestrial life really is possible. Many of the building blocks used
by terrestrial life, the sugars, amino acids and bases, seem to be extraterrestrial. They are produced in the great clouds of dust between the
stars and during the formation of the solar system. The discovery of
“extremophile life on earth”, organisms thriving in hostile environments,
previously assumed to be absolutely sterile. Interest in this branch of
microbiology has grown enormously since the 1990s; now it feels as if in
any location we care to check we invariably find life flourishing. Life,
once started, seems to have become utterly irrepressible, adapting to fill
almost any damp niche. There is evidence for liquid water on many planets
and moons within the solar system; indeed it ought to be abundant on
any planet at an appropriate distance from its’ star, so these discoveries
311
at the extremes of our own world are obviously tremendously important.
However, we should remember that extremophiles are extreme only in
relation to the capabilities of other cells.
Surviving very low temperatures is often not a problem. Many
organisms can be frozen and later re-animated fertility clinics regularly
store eggs in liquid nitrogen at around minus 200 degrees Celsius. Such
cold loving bacteria are called psychrophiles. Psychrophiles are at home in
Antarctic waters and deep-sea sediments; certain psychrophiles are
active within Antarctic ice at minus 20 degrees Celsius. Heat-loving
organisms, thermophiles, face the opposite difficulties. They have evolved
enzymes with extra bonds, to stop them shaking apart at high
temperatures and membranes with reduced fluidity. Although higher
temperatures allow chemical reactions to proceed much more quickly
and so, in one sense, thermophiles have an advantage, above about 150
degrees Celsius, many organic molecules decompose. This sets an absolute
upper limit on survivability and so far, no organism has been isolated that
can tolerate more than 121 degrees Celsius (a record set by an archaeal
chemoautotroph). The majority of extremely heat tolerant organisms,
hyperthermophiles, are archaea. 10 Thermophiles are normally found in
environments like the flanks of volcanoes and around geysers and
geothermal hot springs. Salt-loving halophiles live in high saline water.
Osmosis is the process by which water tends to move into regions with
highest concentration of solutes; that is, from most to least dilute. Hypersaline environments are created by high evaporation rates from lakes,
such as the Dead Sea and number of organisms are found living in this
hostile environment. Earth’s biosphere is a vanishingly thin film across
the very surface, sandwiched between the rock-melting heat of the
mantle below and the cold void of space above. We have found cells
roughly 5 km deep into the crust and around 40 km up into the thinning
atmosphere.
The theory of “Panspermia”, meaning literally “seeds everywhere” is a
notion that cells could be transported between planets and moons aboard
meteorites, has been resurrected and is rapidly gathering encouraging
evidence. Earth’s crust ejected into space would be literally teeming
with life. And it takes only a single bacterium to survive the interplanetary
voyage, to reawaken, to grow, to divide and to spread beyond the impact
10
Archaea or Archaebacteria, common name for a group of one-celled organisms,
many of which do not require oxygen or sunlight to live.
312
crater for its descendants to infect an entire virgin world. At right distance
from the stars, thousands of planets could have developed cell-based
life across the universe. Some civilizations could have dodged death,
outliving all the dangerous astronomical attempts, due to their advanced
technology. These civilizations, possibly tried larger scale scientific
experiments in cosmology, exploiting matter and its forces. I think it is
not too outrageous to believe, that these civilization are still
experimenting. What would you say if our present universe, stars, planets
and galaxies, is one of those experiments, conducted by some advanced
civilizations? Are you shocked? Just wait a minute, it’s not yet over! Are you
ready for one more shock? On the other hand, what would you feel if I say that
the present universe is the result of that experiment which went wrong? The
existing universe is undoubtedly tampered, even though it was perfect
when God made. Bible reports that “whatever God made, it was good.”
What happened to the “God’s Good World?” What is the origin of evil?
But, our human history, for the past 15 billion years is very consistent in
exploiting nature, human activity of tampering, interfering, and destroying.
It might have motivated by curiosity, after all the earthlings are curious
creatures. Consequently, God’s universe became man’s universe: there is
good and evil; there is life and death, there is virtue and sin and there is
perfection and imperfection. Even though there might be perfection in
the cosmic order, in the higher level, on the other hand in the bottom
level, life on earth sometimes becomes testament for disorder and
disharmony. However, I believe that God is capable of creating a better
world than this!
The creation story could be a good example. God told man, “don’t eat
of that tree”, not to exploit the natural world and scientific world. Eating
of the fruit from the forbidden tree symbolizes an insatiable exploiting
nature of humanity. Global Warming and Climate Change undoubtedly
are the consequences of this exploiting nature. The present universe: stars,
planets, life and man perhaps, are the victims of scientific exploitation,
conducted by some advanced civilizations in the universe. In the 5th century
BC Zoroaster from Persia taught that universe was created by God in
perfect order and harmony, on the other hand, our present universe is the
result of devil’s interference. Hence, the battle between the sons of
darkness and sons of light goes on from the beginning of the universe.
Zoroastrianism worships only one God as creator, Ahura Mazda. And it
focuses on the finite between good (Spenta Mainyu) and evil (Arga
Mainyu). The battle is split into four three-thousand-year segments. Good
313
and evil prepare their forces the Amahraspandas and the Yazatas, similar
to archangels and angels on God’s side; demons and evil spirits on evil’s
side, in the first and second segments, in the third they fight, and in the
fourth, God vanquishes evil. And ultimately, when all have reformed, the
devil and his works are destroyed, heaven and earth become one, and
ever yone can live with God. I t ’s this happy ending that makes
Zoroastrianism such a hopeful religion.
Similar example could be found from the Bible: the parable of the
wheat and the weeds. Sowing of good seed symbolizes the creation of
the universe, while, sowing of weeds symbolizes the human activity of
exploiting natural and scientific worlds. Looking for scientific proof from
a parable is like searching for needle in the haystack. The teaching of
Jesus becomes a strong cosmological statement: stress is evidently on
the scientific exploration of human activity which leads to the tampering
with nature. Admittedly, the terrible distances between galaxies could
well preclude any communication beyond the science fictional, but it’s
good to think they’re out there, those probabilistic star-flecked partners
in space-time. And who knows? They may be better off than we are and
have found the perfect intergalactic wormhole and are steadily heading our
way. We can’t promise, but we will try, with all our heart and hemoglobin
and every one of our 90 trillion body cells and our bacterial symbionts,
too, to hang on, and dodge our own bullets, and be here when they
arrive.
Life Science - Biology
Life science is the study of living things, known as biology. Modern
science has penetrated deep inside the secret of life, decoding its code
and its’ elements. Science has taught us that every living organism is
made up from the same substance that codes genetic information, namely,
adenine, guanine, thymine and cytosine. Living things tend to fascinate
people of all ages. Infants mesmerized by the family dog, toddlers by
the scurrying of insects. Schoolchildren are amazed by the monarch
butterfly emerging from its cocoon; adolescents gaze in the mirror, seeing
their bodies develop. Adults cultivate gardens, watch birds, and hike
through forests. And still the wonders of life never cease. A person could
spend a lifetime investigating and observing them. Some people do.
They are biologists, and their life’s work is the study of living things.
Biology is a study that is never completed; there always is more to learn.
Nobody is certain how many species of living things there are. Estimates
314
suggest at least 10 million but there may be many more. Living things are
incredibly diverse: There are organisms that consist of just one cell, such
as bacteria. Other kinds have many cells but are tiny, such as slime molds.
Some multi-celled creatures, like the blue whale, are enormous. Organisms
are complex, with structures as powerful as an eagle’s wings and as subtle
as the alveoli, the minuscule air chambers in the lungs. The interactions
among organisms, such as bees pollinating flowers even as they gather
food, are equally amazing.
In their quest to understand living things, scientists employ a variety
of tools and techniques. To assist them in observing nature, they use
specialized equipment like microscopes, Petri dishes, 11 dissection kits,
gene sequencers, satellite collars, and submersibles. To help them test
their hypotheses, or tentative conclusions, they set up ingenious
experiments. In the seventeenth century, Italian scientist Francesco Redi
placed meat in containers, some covered, others uncovered, to
demonstrate that maggots were not generated spontaneously from
decaying meat but hatched from the eggs of flies. Since Redi’s time,
biologists have learned a great deal about how living things work. Darwin
explained how life evolved; Mendel discovered the laws of genetics;
Pasteur showed that germs cause disease; and Watson and Crick revealed
the structure of DNA. Today biologists in numerous sub-disciplines among
them microbiology, biochemistry, botany, zoology, anatomy, physiology,
ecology, marine biology, and neuroscience build on past discoveries
and attempt to penetrate the mysteries that yet remain. Even though
much still is unknown, a great deal of knowledge has accumulated. Indeed,
so much is known that no individual specialist can grasp everything that
has been discovered in every field.
The basic characteristics that distinguish life from non-life are fairly
clear. These characteristics include reproduction, growth, and metabolism.
Another basic characteristic is the concept that living things exhibit
increasingly complex levels of organization. Subatomic particles make
up atoms, which make up molecules, which make up cells, the basic unit
of all living things. But as complexity increases, it becomes harder to
trace the details of every organism’s functioning. In a typical animal, cells
are the building blocks of tissues, organs, and the systems in which the organs
operate. Within the animals, the individual physiological structures, lungs,
11
Dish for growing cultures: a shallow flat-bottomed dish with a loose cover, used
especially to grow bacterial cultures in the laboratory.
315
blood vessels, intestines carry out specific functions like respiration,
circulation, digestion. These functions enable the sur vival and
reproduction of the organism. Organisms themselves are parts of still
higher levels of organization, such as populations and ecosystems. Today’s
organisms evolved from simpler forms and are related to one another
through the elaborate branching of the evolutionary tree of life. Humans,
too, are part of that tree, though the mysterious workings of their larger
brains make them more complex than their primate cousins.
For all their unique accomplishments, pyramids, opera, philosophy,
airplanes, to name a few, humans are still animals. Close cousins of
chimpanzees, they are members of the primate order in the class
Mammalia and the Phylum Chordata. A human is composed of more than
10 trillion cells, is physiologically active, interacts with its ecosystems,
and lives in social groups analogous to those of other mammals. For all
these reasons, humans are a fit subject for biological scrutiny. But there
are things that make humans distinctive, including their language, their
intelligence, and the fact that only humans can be biologists. The study
of humans is of interest both because of what humans alone possess.
Scientists have made remarkable advances in nearly every aspect of
human biology, how embryos develop and adult age, the architecture of
the brain and its relation to thinking and feeling, how individual behavior
and social structures may be influenced by genetic imperatives, and
how to treat diseases that plague us. Scientists have only begun to
decipher the data from the Human Genome Project.12 Through a process
known as sequencing, the Human Genome Project has identified nearly
all of the estimated 20,000 to 25,000 genes (the basic units of heredity)
in the nucleus of a human cell. The project has also mapped the location
of these genes on the 23 pairs of human chromosomes, the structures
containing the genes in the cell’s nucleus. Exploration of the brain really
has just begun. But much remains mysterious about the biology of human
beings. In some ways, the study of the human animal has only just begun.
Welcome to Chemistry
Curiosity, Creativity, Persistence, humans throughout time have been
driven by the need to understand and make sense of their surroundings.
Our natural curiosity had led us to explore our world and those worlds
12
Human Genome Project, international scientific collaboration that seeks to
understand the entire genetic blueprint of a human being (see Genetics). This genetic
information is found in each cell of the body, encoded in the chemical
deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA).
316
beyond the boundaries of our own atmosphere, and to develop and
create theories that seek to explain wonders that might otherwise be
taken for granted on a daily basis. Primitive man observes that a spearhead
left exposed to the elements changes in appearance over time. A mishap
next to campfire results in a shiny new substance that had not previously
existed. The innate desire to express itself spawns the creation of paints
and pigments derived from plants and the earth. This inquisitiveness
fostered a methodical, scientific approach to investigations as early
humans sought to delve into nature’s mysteries with any means available
to them. Today our tools may be very different, but our impulses are the
same. Chemistry has proved to be a powerful bridge between the
physical and biological sciences, uniting the organic and inorganic
worlds. Physicists may be concerned with the birth of stars and planets, but
it is chemistry that provides the foundation for understanding the elemental
makeup of the universe. Biologists probe the workings of the human cell,
but the molecules involved in these processes must be understood from
within their chemical context. Chemistry is about understanding the
composition and mechanisms that lie beneath the veneer of the world
visible to the naked eye. And the more answers we find, the more
questions we create.
Ancient chemistry had its roots in philosophy, Aristotle, Democritus,
and others yearned for a cogent explanation for the way the world worked,
and used their gifts of logic to “reason” answers that would satisfy them
and those who looked to them for answers. The ancients marveled at
expanses of white sand that appeared unified and smooth from a distance
but were, in fact, composed of billions of tiny, seemingly uniform particles.
This simple observation led some of science and philosophy’s earliest
minds to ponder the composition of matter and consider the possibility
that a living being, a rock, or a palm frond might also be composed of
billions of tiny units that could not be viewed from a distance. The ancient
belief that all matter was formed of earth, air, fire, and water, combined
with a desire to create gold from less noble metals drove scientific thought
for centuries. As science advanced, and the Age of the Enlightenment
shaped the chemical revolution of the eighteenth century, the magic
and mysticism that had permeated science was replaced by a
commitment to empirical research and experimentation, the identification
of the elements and advances in the deciphering of that building block
of all known matter, the elusive atom, once called “atomos” by the Greeks
so many thousands of years before.
317
With great knowledge and power comes great responsibility. Some
of the most remarkable advances in chemical science have resulted in
dangerous consequences that threaten us and the world as we know it.
Foolhardy hubris has the capacity to derail our best intentions, and the
speed with which new discoveries can be turned into marketable
products is dizzying but unsettling. In our rush to “fix” a perceived
problem, we can create greater ones if the ramnifications of our new
discoveries are not fully understood or even explored before they are
put into use. The development of the pesticide DDT, for example,
promised to eradicate the threat of dangerous insects. Yet even today,
we are still living with its toxic legacy, one that has decimated the world’s
avian population and polluted our own blood streams. Rachel Carson,
whose landmark book “Silent Spring” launched the modern environmental
movement, explained it best: “For the first time in the history of the world,
every human being is now subjected to contact with dangerous chemicals,
from the moment of conception until death.” However, if we tread carefully,
chemistry can prove to be as powerful an ally as anyone could wish for.
Rational drug design holds the promise of a cancer-and AIDS-free future.
Green technology is providing options that will help all of us combat
some of the environmental ills that modern times have helped create.
And nanotechnology will enable us to do work and provide therapies on
a scale rarely even contemplated before the 1990s. As we ponder our
place in an ever-expanding universe and marvel still at the billions of
tiny grains of sand that line our shores, chemistry will carry our curiosity
and creativity into whichever future we choose.
The challenge and the thrill of chemistry, and its virtually limitless
applications, lie in the fact that the game is always changing. There is no
end, no final achievements, and no culminating discovery. Everything
new is old again, in a sense, as scientific advancements quickly render
obsolete the remarkable accomplishments of a previous era. Each new
discovery feeds the progress of a different discipline. Advances in
computer technology, for example, have refined researchers’ abilities to
“see” molecular structures, allowing for improvements in drug-designing
methods. Nanotechnology is taking computer-processing units down to
the scale of the atom, and someday we may have functional computers
that can travel through the vascular system, monitoring our health and
delivering drugs. Yet nature triumphs all. Infinitely adaptable and always
unpredictable, nature often lobs a curveball at us, in the form of a resistant
strain of bacteria, for example, just when we think we have created the
318
perfect antibiotic. Yet this same source of frustration is so often the grand
inspiration for some of mankind’s greatest scientific endeavors. Nature
throws down the gauntlets and science gladly accepts the challenge.
The game of discovery goes on.
Mathematical science – Math is a Means to an End
With the aid of mathematics, scientists can calculate solar eclipses
thousands of years in advance, for example, or gauge when to launch a
space probe so that it will rendezvous with Neptune, or predict the life
span and death throes of a distant star. Mathematics has proved to be
such a potent means for dissecting reality that many scientists see it as
not merely a human invention, like a microscope or a computer, but a
reflection of traits inherent to the cosmos, a glimpse into its underlying
architecture and operating system. By this view, you needn’t be the
hominid descendant of a lungfish or the intellectual descendant of the
Greek mathematician Euclid 13 to realize that the structure of space-time
has a distinct, saddleback geometry to it, which we earthlings label nonEuclidean. When somebody says they were the first person to discover
quantum mechanics or relativity or the like, I always think to myself, it’s
probably been discovered millions of times before, by other civilizations
elsewhere in this galaxy or in other galaxies. Math is a language, not the
language, and its symbols can be explained in other idioms.
Human Science - Sociology
The capacity for history is a mark of the human. History begins as
each human being’s own personal history. Each carries a personal memory
of his own past. The beginning of it is shrouded in each case, for each
must learn of it by believing the word of his parents. The end of it is
likewise shrouded, although each knows that the end is certain. This
memory of personal events and affairs, of one’s own is an elemental human
fact. Linked with it is a second capacity, that of thinking reflectively upon
the meaning of these events in order to interpret their significance. This
capacity for philosophy and hence for a philosophy of history is likewise
a mark of the human. History, philosophy and the philosophy of history
begin with the fact of human persons, qualitatively distinct as forms of
13
Euclid (mathematician), (lived circa 300 BC), Greek mathematician, whose chief
work, Elements, is a comprehensive treatise on mathematics in 13 volumes on such
subjects as plane geometry, proportion in general, the properties of numbers,
incommensurable magnitudes, and solid geometry.
319
life on this planet. Each human family maintains some rudimentary kind
of group memory, preserved in oral discourse. This family history is vivid
back to the grandparents, fades rapidly with the great-grand-grandparents
and usually disappears beyond them. When families coalesce into their
larger groups, the tribes, tongues, peoples and nations of the earthly
scene, group memory of the past continues to set the human apart from
the other animal species and kingdoms. Always men hand on a narrative
of great events, divine events which took place in illo tempore, events
which give the tribe its characteristic heritage of beliefs and values, the
substance of its education and the meaning of the rites by which its
youth passes into responsible adulthood. And thus man in his early simple
tribal condition lived forward in time. Eventually the outcome of his living
in space and time could be seen as human history or human science.
Human science is the study of all aspects of human life and culture.
Human science examines such topics as how people live, what they
think, what they produce, and how they interact with their environments.
With the rise of human civilization about 8,000 years ago and especially
since the Industrial Revolution in the mid-1700s, human beings began to
alter the surface, water, and atmosphere of earth. About five million years
ago in Africa, a new kind of mammal split off from the rest of the ape
family. This was the hominid branch, the line from which modern humans
evolved. Recent findings in biology have placed man equal with apes. With
such an intellectual and scholarly heritage in Western civilization wherein
the reductionist image 14 of man as a complex machine reducible to
simple elements and whose whole existence, it is asserted, can be
exhaustively explained by the laws of physics and chemistry, it is no
small wonder that science in its many-splendored forms suggests
unbelief. Astrophysics will explain the origin of the universe; biochemistry,
the origins of life; genetics, all organic evolution; paleontology will reconstruct human ancestry. Religion’s insistence that each human being is
a genuinely unique and noble occurrence, that God is the source of all
being, rather than that God is dead, is seen to be utterly irrelevant. It is an
easy and valid assumption then that science can be and has been as a
basis for unbelief.
The harvesting of stem cells from embryos is another area of
controversy. Many scientists believe that stem cells, cells with the ability
to develop into any body tissue, can one day be used to replace damaged
14
Oversimplification: the oversimplifying of something complex, or the misguided
belief that everything can be explained in simple terms.
320
tissues and treat diseases. But mining the cells from embryos and many
people think that this is murder. Often on religious grounds, they believe
that a human embryo is a human being with a right to life, and therefore want
to stop embryonic stem cell research. People who do not share their view
want to permit it so potentially life-saving medical research can go on.
With all of scientific heritage, with its spirit and ethos appearing
incompatible with the Judeo-Christian tradition, is it true that science
actually promotes unbelief and if it is so to what degree? Relative answers
could be found in sociology. To turn to sociology and to measurement of
attitudes and opinions is to turn from the exactness and precisions of
both the physical and life sciences. Sociologists approach the questions
with their own discipline which is neither the methods of physical nor
life sciences, nor of history or philosophy. Sociology is a ‘human science’
people oriented; and since the human being and human race are involved,
it cannot fulfill the canons of experimental science in their simplicity,
predictability, and reproducibility. But, what light can it shed? There is no
doubt that science, in its many-faceted forms, has been a basis for unbelief.
Moreover, it has been a cherished dogma that science is a truly
secularizing agent in society, inimical to religious affiliation and belief.
Sociologists have endeavored to measure the relationships between
religion and science as they affect the general public, university students,
and university professors. They seek relationships, as revealed through
statistical measurements, between science and scientists with religion
and church membership, and with believers and non-believers.
Geology - Geospatial Technologies
Planet Earth is part of the solar system, and this solar system is literally
formed of star dust. Cataclysmic explosions of early-generation stars
distributed the heavy elements that were created by fusion inside the
star. As these materials were strewn into the universe they gradually began
to congregate once again, thanks to gravitational attraction. Along with
less-dense matter, such as hydrogen and helium, heavy elements helped
to form the rotating cloud of gas and dust called the pre-solar nebula.
Heavy elements such as iron and nickel tended to stick together, and in
sizes ranging from dust particles to moon-sized asteroids these refractory
materials found themselves orbiting the massive center of the nebula,
that is, if they escaped falling into its center. The rocky planets that orbit
our sun represent local gravity wells: in other words, accumulations of solid
mass that attract other massive solids. Earth, then, seems to have grown bit
321
by bit in a process that continues to the present each time a meteor or
speck of cosmic dust enters the atmosphere. In the early days, however,
there was nothing gradual about the collisions of meteors that must have
fused and melted the earliest rotating glob of material that we could
have identified as earth. We live on a planet that records its own history.
Yet for all the texts scratched onto its surface, earth can also be a taciturn
mule of a research subject, close to the vest and physically just about
impenetrable. The deepest hole ever drilled got 8 km down, a mere two
thousands of the distance to the planet’s searing inner core. Most of what
geologists know about the inner earth they have gleaned indirectly.
Whatever technical limitations they may chafe under, geologists have
come a long way since Jules Verne 15 imagined the center of the earth.
I must say it’s a shame that respectable theologian dispensed long
ago with the idea of hell as a specific, corporeal, very hot and nasty place
located deep underground and have replaced it with a flaccid metaphor
along the lines of “hell is the spiritual desert in which one dwells if one
turns away from God.” As it happens, there is a raging inferno buried some
2,300 km underground, an authentic hell on earth, and it is none other than
our planet’s core. This pyred pit, this devil’s spa and nail salon, is a ball of
blazing metal roughly the size of Mars, 90% iron and the rest mostly
nickel, and it burns at a temperature of 6000 degrees Celsius, nearly as hot as
the surface of the sun. The core has been seething continuously since,
earth coalesced and with almost unmitigated brimstone, cooling by only
300 degrees over the past 4 billion years. The core is extremely hot. The
space through which earth is hurtling is about minus 270 degrees Celsius.
As the molten metal of the outer core glides around the solid iron of the
inner, the motions generate earth’s magnetic fields, which could well be
called magnetic shields. Extending outward into space for thousands of
miles, the magnetic field help to deflect much of the solar wind, the crackling
cataract of high-energy particles that streams nonstop from the surface of
the sun, and that would, if left unchecked, strip away at our atmosphere as
surely as turpentine does paint. Terrestrial magnetism then colludes with
the cosseted atmosphere to defend the planet’s surface against the sun’s
most dangerous light. Together air and magnetic fields scatter most solar
X-rays, cosmic rays, and gamma rays before the radiation can reach us
and tatter our cells and genes. Magnetic fields also infuse the world with
15
Jules Verne (1828-1905), French author, who is often regarded as the father of
science fiction. His work “Journey to the Center of the Earth” has been made a blockbuster
movie in Hollywood.
322
a sense of place, an inherent cartography of north and south, and many
creatures are thought to navigate by tapping into terrestrial magnetism.
Our moon is only 240,000 miles away, or ten times the circumference
of earth; if you could fly there by ordinary jet, it would take twenty days.
But that’s it for the whimsical honeymoon options, practically speaking. A
journey by jet to the sun would last twenty-one years, at which point
passengers should be advised that contents in the overhead compartment
and the compartment itself may have melted. To gain a richer sense of
cosmic proportions, we can paraphrase William Blake, 16 and see the earth
as a fine grain of sand. The sun, then, would be an orange-sized object
twenty feet away, while Jupiter, the biggest planet of the solar system,
would be a pebble eighty-four feet in the other direction, almost the
length of a basketball court and the outermost orbs of solar system, Saturn,
Uranus and Neptune would be larger and smaller grains, respectively
found at a distance of two and a quarter blocks from Granule Earth.
Assuming our little solar system is tucked into a quiet neighborhood in
Mumbai, you won’t reach the next stars, the Alpha Centauri triple star
system, until somewhere just west of Dubai, or the star after that until the
foothills of the Alps. Our Milky Way has about 300 billion stars to its credit,
but those stars are dispersed across a vast piece of property 100,000
light-years in diameter. That’s roughly 6 trillion miles (the distance light
travels in a year). Our Milky Way is expected to collide someday with its
nearest neighbor, M31, more familiarly known as the Andromeda Galaxy,17
but we’re talking about an awfully delayed train wreck, may be 4 billion
years in the future.
Giant leap has been made in the field of geology. Scientists have
scanned the mountains, plains, oceans and forests. Global Positioning
System (GPS) has taken us to far away places without loosing our direction.
16
William Blake (1757-1827), English poet, painter, and engraver, who created an
unusual form of illustrated verse; his poetry, inspired by mystical vision, is among the
most original, lyric, and prophetic in the language.
17
Andromeda (astronomy), in astronomy, large constellation of the northern
hemisphere situated just south of the constellation Cassiopeia and west of the
constellation Perseus. Andromeda contains no stars of the first magnitude but is noted
as the area of sky containing the Andromeda Galaxy, a member of the local group to
which our own Milky Way belongs. At a distance of 2.2 million light-years, the Andromeda
Galaxy is both the nearest spiral galaxy and the most distant object that can be seen
with the naked eye. Before its nature was determined by means of powerful telescopes, it
was erroneously believed to be a nebula, or cloud of interstellar matter. Through
telescopes it is seen to have two small companion galaxies of elliptical form.
323
New computer tools are changing the way that geologists go about
making their maps. Image processing of satellite images provides
information that is difficult or impossible to acquire on the ground. New
techniques in data processing and other fields are dramatically enhancing
the speed and precision with which geological field investigations can
take place, and, for obvious reasons, are essential for the study of planetary
geology. Geographic Information Systems, or GIS, refers to a host of
techniques and technologies used to manage and analyze digitally
referenced geographic information. GIS includes the geographic data itself,
along with the hardware and software needed to analyze the data. The
technology used to capture the data in part of GIS as well. GIS is used to
create a digital mockup of the world called a geographic database in a
process known as geo-visualization, where maps that include additional
information, such as pie charts, population density, or location of geological
features, are used to access the information in the complete geo-database,
which is likely to be too complicated to be rendered on a simple two
dimensional map.
Advanced analytical tools can be used to manipulate data from
existing datasets, overlay particular geographic features, and to output
desired datasets, particularly customized maps and associated data. As
an example, consider a study intended to assess the dangers of potential
pesticide use on permeable soil. A digital map of the study area
watershed will be linked or clipped to the geology of the area to form a
geologic map. To this, another layer will be added showing permeable
soil types. In a separate operation, all land uses in the region of interest
will be linked to potential pesticide use in the area. This dataset will then
be combined with the watershed, geology soils data to render the geodatabase, which can then be used as a powerful tool for the intended
study. We are beginning to see very fruitful fusions of approaches from
traditional geology (for example, tectonic models) and geo-processing.
For example, remotely sensed images using visible, near-infrared, and
mid-infrared channels are being used to bridge the gap from regional to
local scales in the inference of geological structure. In a 2005 article
published in the journal “Remote Sensing of Environment”, P.C. Fernandez
da Silva, J.C. Gripps, and S.M. Wise used a combination of remote sensing
techniques and empirical tectonic models to infer geological structures
that would have otherwise been unknown. Such research strategies
promise a great, and greatly useful, series of information and data
interchanges between earth sciences and the environmental sciences.
324
Geo-processing is an inherently interdisciplinary tool because it is based
on the utilization and recombination of existing datasets.
Ecology – Darwinian Natural Selection
Modern science has cracked down many secrets about earth; plate
tectonics, earth’s magnetic field, ocean conveyer belt and ozone layer.
The most fascinating of them all, the “Theory of Natural Selection” stands
out as a morning star against the black sky. Darwin’s theory of evolution;
descent with modification through natural selection is remarkably simple.
“Descent with modification” refers to the gradual emergence of new
species over time from changes to previously existing species. “Natural
selection” is the process responsible for these changes. It means that over
time the average fitness of creature increases, leading to new species.
This generation of one species from another can then be traced backwards
so that, ultimately, all living creatures are descended from a single being.
The evolution of the universe as a whole involved the progressive
emergence of new levels of complexity that could not have occurred in
previous epochs, such as chemistry of life. This suggests, certain
directionality in the universe, from simple to complex, and has led some to
suggest that there is purpose in the universe. Some scientists also believe
that evidence of design can be inferred from the observation that the
constants of nature seem to be incredibly finely tuned for the production
of life. Evolutionary theory does not rule out the possibility that God
intervenes in the normal workings of the universe. This is because the
probabilistic nature of the theory that mutation is at random:“leaves room”
for God to act. God does not simply set up the universe and then leave it
to run of its own accord, but that he is involved in a continuous act of
creation. I would like to use a musical analogy to illustrate God’s action in
the universe. Music is produced by both the musician and the instrument.
You can’t separate these things because you require both to produce
the music. Likewise, in the universe, everything comes from God and
everything comes from nature. There is a bridge to God through Darwin:
One just has to know how to walk across it. The idea that Charles Darwin’s
discoveries about natural selection destroyed his Christian faith is a myth.
Rather, what made the great naturalist, born 200 years ago, agnostic, was
the inability of his lukewarm vision of Christianity to deal with acute
personal suffering.
Darwin’s was a Christian faith based more on rational defenses of the
logic and coherence of the Apostles’ Creed than it was a personal
325
commitment to or moving experience of Jesus Christ. In this, he was
simply an inheritor of more than 100 years of theological tradition, in
which the shift to natural philosophy that had occurred in the mid
seventeenth century gradually began to edge aside the more
distinctively Christian justifications for Christian faith. His Christianity was
true primarily because the natural world pointed to structure, harmony
and happiness. It was no surprise, therefore, that when he first recognized
that the natural world was not as ordered, purposive or benign as had
been thought, the Christian structure that towered above these
foundations toppled. We face similar temptations today. Darwin thought
that evolution by natural selection removed all direction and purpose from
the natural world. Things exist the way they do not because they are designed
or intended but simply because they fit into a particular, temporary
environmental niche. There is no purpose to life, beyond fraught attempts
simply to survive. Recent years, however, have seen the debate about
“design” change somewhat, as we have come to recognize the ubiquity
of convergence, what the British paleontologist Simon Conway Morris
called “the recurrent tendency of biological organization to arrive at the
same ‘solution’ to a particular need.” Eyes, wings, legs, claws, teeth, brain,
tool-use, agriculture and much more else besides have evolved time and time
again. There are, after all, only so many ways of feeding, fighting, fleeing
and reproducing. Because the physical environmental constraints upon
evolution on earth are so tight, the emergence of certain features and
activities could be said to be inevitable. Rewind and replay the tape of
life and you would get a picture that was strangely similar to the one we
have today, one in which organisms flew, crawled, heard, smelt, watched
and perhaps even walked, talked, thought and loved. Perhaps evolution
does have a purpose and direction to it after all?
Not surprisingly, this was a phenomenon that Darwin himself noticed.
Towards the end of his Beagle voyage, (name of a British ship) when in
Australia, he noticed that the method used by a lion-ant to capture its
prey was precisely the same as that used by a different European species.
He wrote rhetorically in his diary. “Would any two workmen ever hit on so
beautiful, so simple and yet so artificial a contrivance? It cannot be thought
so. The one hand has surely worked throughout the universe.” Darwin’s
response to this example of convergence was in line with the view taken
by the influential British theologian William Paley, Archdeacon of Carlisle,
who taught that nature contains “every indication of contrivance, every
manifestation of design” and that the designer was God. Certainly, the
326
idea that life invariably navigates its way towards complex “solutions”,
among them the moral, rational, relational, organizational features we see
in mankind, corresponds well with the Christian understanding of creation,
as does the seemingly life-tailored nature of the universe, as articulated
by the anthropic principle.18 But Darwin’s story reminds us, forcefully, that
to base religious faith on such observations is a serious mistake, inviting
collapse when the next scientific revolution comes. It is one thing to
investigate such phenomena as objectively as one can, and then to explore
how consonant they are with a Christian understanding of creation. It is quite
another to treat them as a foundation stone for one’s faith. And the theory
of evolution by natural selection that he formulated during and after this
period certainly highlighted the problem of suffering for him in a new
and problematic way. But it was his experience of suffering, supremely
the death of his daughter Annie at the age of 10 in 1851 that finally
extinguished his faith.
To this extent, the supposedly new and groundbreaking reasons for
Darwin’s loss of faith were as he himself recognized, long established
and widely recognized. At heart, it was the problem of pain. What Darwin’s
theory did was to reformulate that problem. It alerted people to the scale
and seeming necessity of suffering, not just among humans but among all
sentient creatures, for whom the justification of “moral improvement” could
not be made. That said, suffering was not an outright deal breaker for Darwin.
His musings on the subject, in relation to natural selection, were subject,
in relation to natural selection, were subtle and alert us to the fact that
somewhere along the line biology turns into theology and fundamental
value judgments are involved. Today some talk about the suffering of
sentient creatures as if it were a conclusive argument for the non-existence
of God. Others ridicule such sentiments. Whichever conclusion one
adopts, the questions we face, whether the suffering involved in natural
selection is worth the good that results and whether that balance of suffering
and good is compatible with our concept of God, remain judgment calls,
open for each of us to answer as we see fit. For Darwin the balance may
have weighed in favor of happiness over suffering, but that was not enough.
Once he had lived through Annie’s wretched death, he could not reconcile
the reality of suffering with his understanding of the Christian God.
18
Existence of life restricting universe’s type: the assertion that any life existing in a
universe will impose conditions that significantly restrict the physical properties of that
universe.
327
Given the nature of the Paleyan Christianity with which he grew up,
the decision should not surprise us. Paley’s “happy world” had little room
for suffering, which offended its sense of order and harmony, and it offered
no resources for dealing with suffering. That was one on the reasons why
Cardinal Newman railed against it, claiming that it “cannot … tell us one
word about Christianity proper.” Such Christianity was more philosophical
than theological, built on the foundation of seemingly secure and universal
human reason rather than on the particularities of the Christian story, let
alone the counter-intuitive scandal of the Incarnation and the Cross. Put
bluntly, as soon as Christianity moved away from the foot of the Cross and
lost sight of the crucified God, it became defenseless against accusations of
suffering and injustice. In truth, Darwin’s theology never stood anywhere
near the foot of the Cross, even during his orthodox years. The Church
and the theology into which he grew never prepared or equipped him
for suffering. To be sure, a loss like the one he experienced at Easter 1851
could crush any kind of religious faith, but a largely Christ-less Christianity,
of a secure, happy, natural order, offered no defense at all. Darwin died
doubting whether it was even possible to trust one’s own mind in
questions of metaphysics. This ended up being the firmest foundation,
as it were, of his agnosticism. Not only did he not know, but he didn’t
know whether it was possible to know. He might have been right to
doubt his mental ability to determine metaphysical truths but, if so, should
have gone even further, and questioned his mental ability to navigate
physical as well as metaphysical disciplines.
Darwin’s sensitivity to the sublime withered as he grew older. He
lamented in his autobiography that after the age of 30 he could no longer
enjoy poetry, pictures or music. The idea that reliable truth could be
communicated through such instincts, intuitions or experiences, as well
as through the patient interrogation of tangible evidence, was something
Darwin could never really accept. Such skepticism certainly helped
alienate him further from the possibility of religious faith. If, as his wife
Emma once wrote to him, “it is feeling and not reasoning that drives one to
prayer”, it was clear that Darwin could never pray. The reasons for Darwin’s
loss of faith are interesting and relevant to believers and non-believers
today. Questions over what constitutes legitimate and sufficient evidence
for religious beliefs, or how one understands and accommodates suffering
within a religious, or indeed an irreligious, framework are unlikely to
disappear in the near future. Much the same could be said for the way in
which he engaged with those questions, indeed for the way in which he
328
conducted himself throughout his life. Darwin was a diligent collector
and a meticulous obser ver, but he also recognized the need for
speculation. He managed to combine a fierce commitment to his life’s
work with a genuine and disarming openness about its weaknesses. But
perhaps most tellingly, in spite of his loss of faith and the pain he suffered
in seeing three of his children die young, he remained as courteous and
respectful to those who retained religious beliefs as he was to follow
agnostics. He told his friend Brodie Innes, an Anglican clergyman, there
was “no reason why the disciples of either school should attack each
other with bitterness”.
Sometimes he wondered whether he had been too careful, “I may …
have been unduly biased by the pain which it would give some members
of my family, if I aided in any way direct attacks on religion,” he told the
atheist Edward Aveling in 1880. But he never regretted his courtesy.
Family members, colleagues, friends, acquaintances, critics, even the
general public honored and respected him for it. In an age where such
courtesy and grace are notable for their absence from debates about
evolution and religious belief, that is the lesson, above any other, we
need to hear from Charles Darwin. Reaction of the church to “On the
Origin of Species” has moved in the 150 years since its publication from
proscription to an admission that it is more than a hypothesis. Continuous
and often strident opposition by religious believers to Darwin’s theory of
evolution has marked the past century and a half. The heartland of this
opposition has been the United States, where so-called “Creation Science”
or “Creationism”19 was born and where “intelligent design”, an attempt to
demonstrate the need for a designer in nature, has taken hold. However,
religious opposition to Charles Darwin’s ideas, have in recent years
become a feature in many other countries around the world. Yet some
biologists argue just as stridently as the creationists argue that Darwinian
evolution is all we need to explain man’s place in nature and that this
scientific idea makes God redundant.
19
Creationism broad range of beliefs involving an appeal to God’s miraculous
intervention to explain the origin of the universe, of life, and of the different kinds of
plants and animals on earth. Adherents, called creationists, all invoke divine intervention
to explain at least some of these phenomena, although they do not necessarily agree on
the length of time involved in creation. In the second half of the 20th century, the most
visible and politically active creationists maintained that the entire universe was
created within the past 6000 to 10,000 years.
329
Medical Science – Human Genome
To begin, let’s go back some four and some billion years ago to where
ever it was to the speck of life appeared on earth, may be on the warm
surface of the bubble of water. That speck that did something has gone
uninterrupted ever since. It wrote a message and it was a chemical
message and passed it on to children and its children and its children …
and so on. The message has passed from the very first organism all the
way through time to you and to me, like a continuous thread to all living
things. It’s more elaborate now of course, but that message very simply
called “the secret of life.” That message is contained in the double helix,
stunning and tiny little constellation of chemicals and we call it DNA
(Deoxyribonucleic Acid). You must have seen a picture somewhere in a
book or a magazine. How does it look in a raw condition in a real life? DNA
has a reputation for being a mystical and highly complex molecule with
all these information like your heredity, your features. It’s actually a loop,
very long strands of molecules, this double helix of DNA, all these look
somewhat little threads of cotton and these strands are literally pulled
from the blood cells and may be from the skin cells of a human being.
Whoever contributes DNA to a lab, we can tell from this, whether or not
he is in early risk of Alzheimer’s diseases, you can tell they are in risk of
breast cancer. We can tell 2000 other things we can tell from this tiny
strand. It is quite unlikely that you can tell all these things from such an
insignificant strand like this.
When we look at the DNA sequence, we look at 3 billion chemical
letters and instructions for a human being, our eyes glaze over. But when
scientists look at this, they see stories. Human Gnome is a story book that
has been edited for couple of billion years. This is the story of one of the
biggest scientific adventures ever and at the heart of it, is a very small
but very powerful molecule DNA. For the past 10 years, scientists all over
the world have been painstakingly trying to read tiny instructions that
are buried in our DNA and finally now the human genome has been
decoded. We are now decoding and interpreting the human genetic
code. This is ultimate unimaginable one could do scientifically and look
at our own instruction book and trying to understand what it is telling us.
This is the moment we were waiting for? What it’s telling us? It is so surprising
and so strange and so unexpected is that 50% of the genes in a banana are in
us. We may be very different from a banana. All the machines that replicate
your genes, the machinery that controls the cell cycle, cell surface,
machines that make nutrients are all that the same. So what all these
information have to do with us and with me, perhaps we can possibly
330
imagine? Which one of us will get cancer or arthritis, or Alzheimer’s? Will
there be cures? Will parents in the future are able to determine their
children’s genetic destiny? We have opened the box here that has got
the huge amount of valuable information it is the key, in understanding
disease and the long run, can able to cure the disease.
Double Helix
DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) is a double-stranded molecule that is twisted into
a helix like a spiral staircase. Each strand is comprised of a sugar-phosphate
backbone and numerous base chemicals attached in pairs. The four bases that
make up the stairs in the spiraling staircase are adenine (A), thymine (T), cytosine
(C) and guanine (G). These stairs act as the “letters” in the genetic alphabet,
combining into complex sequences to form the words, sentences and paragraphs
that act as instructions to guide the formation and functioning of the host cell.
The DNA Double Helix is one of the greatest scientific discoveries of all time. First
described by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953, DNA is the famous molecule
of genetics that establishes each organism’s physical characteristics. It wasn’t
until mid-2001, that the Human Genome Project and Celera Genomics jointly
presented the true nature and complexity of the digital code inherent in DNA.
We now understand that each human DNA molecule is comprised of chemical
bases arranged in approximately 3 billion precise sequences. Even the DNA
molecule for the single-celled bacterium, E. coli, contains enough information to
fill all the books in any of the world’s largest libraries. Although DNA code is
remarkably complex, it’s the information translation system connected to that
code that really baffles science. The DNA code, like a floppy disk of binary code, is
quite simple in its basic paired structure. However, it’s the sequencing and
functioning of that code that’s enormously complex. Through recent technologies
like x-ray crystallography, we now know that the cell is not a “blob of protoplasm”,
but rather a microscopic marvel that is more complex than the space shuttle. The
cell is very complicated, using vast numbers of phenomenally precise DNA
instructions to control its every function. The scientific reality of the DNA double
helix can single-handedly defeat any theory that assumes life arose from non-life
through materialistic forces. Evolution theory has convinced many people that
the design in our world is merely “apparent”—just the result of random, natural
processes. However, with the discovery, mapping and sequencing of the DNA
molecule, we now understand that organic life is based on vastly complex
information code, and such information cannot be created or interpreted without
a Master Designer at the cosmic keyboard. Like any language, letters and words
mean nothing outside the language convention used to give those letters and
words meaning. This is modern information theory at its core.
Already DNA has told us things that no one has expected. It turns out
that human beings have only twice as many genes of a fruit fly! Now, how
331
it could be? We are such complex and magnificent creatures … but fruit
flies … they are simply fruit-flies. DNA also tells us that we are more
closely related to worms and to yeast than most of us ever have been
imagined. But how do you read what is inside of a molecule? If it is DNA, if
you turn it and look it from a right angle, you’ll see in the middle, what it looks
like steps in a ladder. Each step is made up of two chemicals, Cytosine and
Guanine or Thymine and Adenine. They come always in pairs, called “base
pairs” either C and G or T and A for short. This is step by step a code, 3 billion
steps long; the formula for human being. We are all familiar with this
thing. This shape is very familiar; the double helix, the version of DNA
molecule. Almost every cell in your body, you can find this chain, double
helix, stuck in the nucleus of your cell. If, you stretch out all of DNA, it will
go to thousands of feet. If you could read all the steps of this ladder, we
can find the picture of your children. You have passed this DNA sequence
to your children. People knew for thousands of years that your children
are going to walk like you. So, you must pass something, some instructions
that give them the eyes they have, hair color they have, the nose shape
they do and the only way you pass them through the sentences of double
helix.
The recent success of the Human Genome Project in sequencing all
the genes in the human genetic inheritance left open an important
question. How much of what we are is written in our genes, and how
much of it is written elsewhere, in the natural environment, society, or our
own choice? What is the role of genes and environment in determining
human destiny? Genome research is helping to answer the questions,
but much remains to be learned. The modern era of molecular biology
began almost thirty years ago with the identification of DNA as the
chemical basis of heredity and the discovery of its general structure.
Advances in molecular biology now permit the joining of portions of
DNA molecule from different species into “DNA recombinants,” 20 which
are then inserted into bacterial cells. This technique will facilitate increased
knowledge of basic biological processes because it makes possible the
20
The DNA molecules of all life forms, from oak tree to sea horses, have the same
structure and the same four bases. Scientists have made use of these similarities in a
technology called recombinant DNA. In this laboratory method, one or more genes of an
organism are introduced into a second organism. The new genes, sometimes known as
foreign DNA, become functional in the second organism and produce a desired protein.
In this way, scientists can create changes in the genetic makeup of an organism that
would be unlikely to occur through natural processes.
332
study of individual genes and their component parts. Recombinant DNA
research has already increased understanding of the organization of genes
in lower organisms and of gene duplication. It is rightly thought that
there will be almost unlimited beneficial practical applications as well.
On the other hand, the research is a cause of concern because some
experiments may pose new, unanticipated risks. Biologists are altering
the genes of living things without being able to predict the outcome.
Because this technology has the potential to modify all forms of life, it
requires full exploration of the ends it serves and the means to these
ends. Serious, thoughtful reflection on these matters as well as responsible
collaboration between scientists and the public are morally and
pragmatically imperative. This process of reflection was initiated by the
scientific community on an international level and has expanded to
include members of the public in some local communities. The nature
and extent of the debate, call for respectful, patient, responsible behavior
on the part of all participants.
Future Sciences
Scenario stories explore alternative possible futures. They are used
by leadership and executive groups, communities and individuals to
imagine, rehearse and refine important strategic decisions. The unique
feature of scenario stories is that they represent futures that might have
to be faced, regardless of preferences. The stories tend not to be about
unattainable utopias, nor or they irredeemably apocalyptic. They are
founded on solid, wide-ranging research and seek to combine an
understanding of current patterns and trends with informed anticipation
of likely events, driving forces and other relevant variables to explore
possible future outcomes. We straddle two worlds. One is informed by
our religions and our deep indigenous histories, holistic cosmologies
and cultures. The other is shaped by the European perspective of
Newtonian mechanics, enlightenment rationality and Cartesian logic
(relating to Descartes: relating to René Descartes or his writings or
theories). At the risk of over-simplification the core difference between
the two cosmologies emerges from their different perspectives on the
relationship between humanity and the natural world. If this relationship
is one of dominion in the European cosmology, for the people of the
third world it is one of interdependence. In the European legacy, the
natural world and its extremities are to be conquered and managed. But
for the people of the third world, nature was a partner in everyday life,
albeit a troublesome one at times. We straddle these two worlds. This
333
straddling is reflected in our daily duet and duel between the “formal”
and the “informal.” It is echoed in our ways of being, our relationships and
institutions. We are constantly navigating and negotiating between these
two worlds; they co-exist simultaneously, with varying visibility and
influence, but neither can be ignored. We juggle multiple beliefs,
identities, languages, and realities on an ongoing basis.
Perhaps the deepest assumption is about the path to prosperity. We
are convinced that prosperity and modernization, development, will flow
from industrialization and a more complete immersion into the global
economy. So, we try to add value to our subsistence agriculture through
agro-businesses. We are keen to upgrade our infrastructure to reduce
the costs of doing business and to attract investors. And enhancing our
human capacity occupies an important place in our discourse, but less
so in our actions. And yet a tangible improvement in the standard of
living for most of us is perennially elusive. We revel in economic growth
statistic, oblivious to the risk they carry of both seducing and sedating
us. We are dazzled by the ratios and percentages, but pay scant attention
to the absolute numbers of real people that they represent and where
the true picture is most visible. Despite the impressive growth rates
recorded, the absolute number of people in the third world living in
poverty has remained largely unchanged at best, and may have even
increased over the decades. Is the current development model working?
As the cost to our natural environment becomes increasingly apparent,
and our social fabric is strained to breaking point by rising inequality, we
are beginning to count the cost of development. People of the third
world face a tremendous complexity of systemic pressures. However, it
is far from clear that our institutions are up to the task of discerning and
articulating the choices, navigating and arbitrating between competing
interests, resolving conflict and mobilizing us by finding common ground
on which to enlarge the space for vision and action. As we face the
future, we must find a clear answer to the question, “what kind of society
do we want to create?” What do we want? What will we become? Perhaps
we need a new set of eyes through which to look at our societies, the way
they are changing and how we need to respond to their needs.
Future Inventions
Foretelling the future is a difficult feat, but I’m up to the challenge.
There are several areas where I believe there will be significant future
inventions that will dramatically affect our lives, just as the latest scientific
inventions are doing now. The latest scientific inventions and what they
334
mean to us. Who can argue that the cell phone hasn’t changed our lives?
The cell phone was really a cool new invention. And the changes we’ve
experienced are nothing compared to what some third world countries
have experienced with the cell phone. In many countries there is no
infrastructure to support land lines, and thus outside of the cities there is
basically no phone service. Not anymore, now cell phones are popping
up everywhere, providing a service we take for granted. Cell phones
were great, smart phones are better ... What cool new invention will be
next? So getting back to future inventions, how about even more amazing
cell phone devices? I’ve just recently obtained an iPhone, and it is
amazing. But come on, there are more things it could be taught to do!
How about setting it down on a table, and put it in projector mode where
it projects its images onto a wall or screen? Build in a laser pointer. Build
into it health diagnostics. You touch a sensor and it measures your pulse
and blood pressure or whatever. How about try to build in a carbon
monoxide detector? Since you usually have your cell phone with you
even in motels and your work place, it would be perfect for warning you
about smoke or CO2 or any number of other toxic gases. Another area
where we can predict new future inventions is in military weapons and
systems. I just recently saw demonstrations of a new crowd-control type
non-lethal weapon that uses some kind of microwave radiation that makes
humans feel as though they are on fire. The moment you step out of the
beam or it gets blocked or shut off there is no pain. It’s like flipping a
switch on or off. It’s effective up to a mile away. Great weapon! We will
probably see new non-lethal weapons invented. I like to see the military
come up with cool new non-lethal inventions and weapons.
Medical devices can’t be left out. Perhaps medical devices are the
hottest of the categories as far as future inventions, and cool new products
are concerned. Pace makers and insulin pumps are routine these days.
Artificial hearts are keeping patients alive long enough to find donors.
Implantable artificial retinas are being experimented with. Controlling
artificial limbs with brain waves is in its infancy and growing in
effectiveness. We will probably see a rash of artificial organs, and new
prosthetics with new and better methods of control arrive on the scene
in the near future. The most important future inventions might deal with
new ways of harvesting energy, storing energy, and harnessing energy.
When I was a kid the batteries had a carbon anode in the center and a
zinc cathode for the case. The carbon rod in the center was great for
making home-made arc lamps. Anyway, batteries have come a long, long
way, but I predict we will see batteries with 100 times the storage capacity
335
of current batteries. This will make all-electric vehicles a reality and
dramatically change the world economic and political scene. We might
well see a breakthrough in solar cell technology too. Some headway is
being made with wireless power transmission. Who wouldn’t want to get
rid of the cords for all those table and floor lamps? Imagine doing away
with all the power cords in your home and office! Perhaps wireless power
transmission is the next big thing! Wireless house floor lamps and table
lamps would be a really cool new product!
Cyborg
With all the successes in science, one can reasonably predict that by 2020
scientists will be able to connect a variety of organs to silicon chips, possibly
reactivating paralyzed or inactive body organs, and even connecting directly to
brain, known as cyborg. A physically mixed system is usually called a cyborg. Cyborg
is an organism with a machine built into it with consequent modification of
function; and an organism which is part animal and part machine. Since some
theorists regard organisms as biological machines, we must define our terms
further. An animal will be defined as a creature whose elements are the result of
“small loop autopoiesis.” That is the creature creates itself but the parts are the
result of localized processes. Mind is not involved in the production of the parts.
Mind results from the functioning of the parts but is manifested in the external
behavior of the organism. A cyborg, then, is a creature composed of some parts
constructed without the benefit of mind and some parts constructed with the
benefit of mind. Furthermore the parts must be of greater than molecular size. A
creature with aspirin in its body is not a cyborg. A creature with an artificial
heart is a cyborg. Under this definition, animals with donated hearts, kidneys or
retinas would also be cyborgs. With this idea is that, in the near future, we may
have more and more artificial body parts—arms, legs, hearts, eyes and digital
computing and communication supplements. The logical conclusion is that one
might become a brain in a wholly artificial body. And the step after that is to
replace your meat brain by a computer brain. Implants are the most difficult
enhancements, as the human body does not have clean internal interfaces that
would allow easy physical combinations with technology. The external interfaces
are a lot more flexible. So during all of human history augmentation of the body
has been proceeding as additions of physically external elements, and most likely,
this process will continue for a while. Actually, the human looks natural only from
outside, as she holds all kinds of artificially created concepts loaded into her head.
Humans without downloaded knowledge do not exist anymore.
Nanotechnology
On December 29, 2009, we celebrated the golden jubilee of
Nanotechnology. It was on this day, fifty years ago Professor Richard P.
336
Feynman (Nobel Laureate, 1965) delivered the celebrated talk, “There’s
plenty of room at the bottom”, which predicted the era of nanotechnology,
the technology of nanometer scale objects. He proposed a new kind of
technology by assembling things atom by atom, in today’s terms,
“molecular nanotechnology.” The terminology, nanotechnology itself
came into being in 1974, due to Professor Nario Taniguchi. Feyman talked
about writing the entire Encyclopedia Britannica on the tip of a needle;
he envisioned that one day the entire information of the world could be
contained in an envelope. He forecasted that little motors could move within
blood vessels and do surgeries, as if the surgeon has gone. Today it is possible
to direct tiny diagnostic and therapeutic objects into the body and even
into specific cells. Although such “surgeons” do not travel through the
blood vessels as of now, diagnostic and therapeutic agents do. Single
elements of electronic storage are now in nanoscale so that entire libraries
can be written in hand-held devices. It is now possible to see the evolution
in size, shape and properties of pieces of matter, atom by atom, as the
object is made. As a result, we can probe questions such as the electrical
conductivity of a single DNA strand or strength of single chemical bonds.
Nanotechnology is expected to produce goods and services worth $2.6
trillion in the year 2014 globally.
What would nanotechnology do to the world? Will it be another peak
in the unending chain of scientific excitements? Nanotechnology implies
the power to manipulate matter at the atomic level. It is the power of the
creator, as well as all are constructed with atoms. Once this capability is
comprehended fully, nothing that matter can deliver is impossible. Naturally,
promises are plenty. It may appear like science fiction when topics such
as single cell therapy are proposed. It is possible to repair the molecular
machinery of life and thereby control, prevent and extend biological
functions. Materials could be made super tough, super light, etc, after all
carbon is the toughest and still quite light. It may one day be possible to
harvest all the energy needed for the planet from the sun and if more is
needed, there is the reaction between hydrogen and oxygen forming
water. The world may be clean and green again. Well, nanotechnology
does give hopes. Thinking of such possibilities, this is what is going on in
nature. All the carbohydrate which plants cook in their leaves, to keep us going
is made atom by atom, from carbon dioxide and water, using sunlight. In the
way we convert that food to energy and then to work, very little wastage
occurs. If biological machinery were to be as inefficient as our motors,
the food we produce cannot even sustain one tenth of the population.
337
Thus, biology is nanotechnology in perfection. Similarly best chemistry is
nanotechnology. It converts atoms to molecules in a clean and green manner,
chemists say with high atom efficiency. All physics is ultimately that is done
at the atomic level. This convergence of disciplines at the nanometer
level is probably one of the biggest benefits of nanotechnology.
In the years to come, scientists and engineers will be building objects
at the molecular level. Imagine, say, a camera so small that it could be
injected into the human body, travel to a diseased site, and relay images
back to doctors. Or consider a device that travels inside human vessels,
dislodging and destroying fats that are clogging arteries. Envision paint
capable of forming circuitry when it dries; paint a room, and it is instantly
wired for electricity. These are just a few of the possible beneficial nanoinventions. Futurists have also warned that nations may invent ultra-small
devices for surveillance and spying. They also fear that living things can
be harmed by nanomachines that are unknowingly inhaled or absorbed into
their skin. At such an early stage in this science, it is difficult to say how
likely or unlikely such scenarios may be. Right now, numerous universities,
government agencies, and private companies are funding investigations
into nanotechnology. Two recent inventions are still tackling the basic
problem of building smaller computer chips. One scientist has developed
an innovative way to “print” new circuits in seconds using an inkjet printer
and special ink made of solvents and crystals of cadmium selenide
(selenium compound: a compound of selenium combined with another
element, e.g. silver selenide). When the ink is applied to plastic, the solvent
evaporates and the crystals remain. After a few passes through a special
printer, the crystals build up and form working transistors. This approach
would be a vast improvement over the current method of fabricating
silicon chips, which takes place in large, sterile factories over periods as
long as three weeks and often requires hundreds of steps.
Future Drug Design
Like a dressmaker designing patterns at an upscale couturier, or an
architect poring over blueprints for a custom-made home, scientists are
creating tailor-made drugs to tackle specific diseases, based on an
increasing knowledge about how they fit together. As scientists gain
insight into how a particular disease functions, because of a
malfunctioning protein, for example, they can more easily design drugs
that target the problem. By combining the benefits of proteomics, genetic
engineering, and advanced computer technology, the process of
338
designing drugs is becoming more efficient and more precise. A variety
of techniques and advances are driving the drug design industry.
Combinatorial chemistry uses various molecular compounds as chemical
“building block” units, systematically combining and rearranging them
to create a huge collection of new chemicals, each one varying a bit
from the others. These can then be screened en masse, and those
candidates that show the most promise in treating the targeted protein
can then be synthesized for further testing. This process, which may also
employ the use of a robotic combinatorial system, allows scientists to
create and then screen thousands of chemicals at once.
The structure of a drug is as important as the chemicals that make it
up. A large part of drug design is described as structure-based design
and focuses on the structure of the target molecule and the drug being
designed for it. Techniques like X-ray crystallography21 are used to identify
the structure of proteins, making it possible for scientists to structure a drug
that will best target the molecule in question. Much like with the enzymesubstrate model,22 Chiefly responsible for metabolism and its regulation,
these molecules have catalytic sites on which substrate fits in a lock-andkey manner to trigger and control metabolism throughout the body.
researchers need to find the right “fit” in order for a drug to be effective.
For this reason, computer simulation and modeling now play a major role
in drug design. Modeling can be used to analyze the molecular
interactions that will occur between drug and target in order to predict
how drugs will function and how well they will be able to bind to their
target site. And all of these techniques work together. In Aids research,
for example, scientists discovered that the survival of HIV was linked to
the HIV protease, a viral enzyme. Using X-ray crystallography, scientists
could see the structure of the HIV protease, and then, using computerbased modeling, they could spin it around and examine it from every
angle, analyzing its properties and narrowing down the list of possible
molecules, perhaps generated through combinatorial chemistry, that
might be able to block its activities.
Max Theodor Felix von Laue (1879-1960), was a German physicist and Nobel Prize
winner. Laue received the 1914 Nobel Prize in physics for his discovery of X-ray
crystallography (the study of patterns produced by the diffraction of X rays by crystal
substances), which provided the means to determine the arrangement of atoms in some
substances.
21
22
All of the enzymes are globular proteins that combine rapidly with other substances,
called substrate, to catalyze the numerous chemical reactions in the body.
339
Science has always gotten some of its best ideas from nature, and
this tendency is showing no sign of changing. Many pharmaceutical
companies are examining properties in natural plants and then using
molecular modeling to reconstruct the compounds in a laboratory setting.
But science is also often faced with the daunting task of keeping up with
nature, and drug design is relied upon more and more to help researchers
do just that. The more that is understood about the human genome and
proteome, the more real the possibility that drugs will be designed to work
best for an individual’s specific genetic makeup. But one of the challenges
facing scientists is that nature keeps things lively, and changeable. Many
reliable drugs that have stood the test of time find themselves facing
evolutionary challenges. For example: Penicillin, the mold derived
antibiotic discovered in 1928, is probably the most widely prescribed
antibiotic today. However, its efficacy in fighting bacteria has been
challenged, as bacteria have now developed their own defense against
their arch-nemesis: an enzyme that destroys it. The same natural wonders
that have inspired and shaped scientific discovery throughout time are
also responsible for throwing up roadblocks, which may then send
research in new, powerful directions. We are constantly witness to the
uneasy, unpredictable relationship at times mutually beneficial, at other
times combative between the world around us and the science that
studies it.
Future Stem Cells 23
The field of stem cell science is still in its infancy. It is a sort of generic
cell that gives rise to specialized cells, that is, cells with more specific
forms and functions. Stem cells are able to divide ad infinitum in culture
media, that is, in artificial nutrient media in a laboratory. Stem cell science
is the study of such cells, either in vitro (under laboratory conditions) or
in vivo (in the living animal or human body). Although stem cell
transplantation has been practiced successfully for over forty years, the
reasons for its success, and underlying mechanisms controlling stem cell
function, are far from being fully explained. Nevertheless, the seductive
functioning of stem cells will always be their defining feature. Stem cells
are the basic unit of embryogenesis (development of embryo) and adult
tissue regeneration. As such, all stem cells must be capable of:
23
Stem Cell – a sort of generic cell which gives rise to specialized cells, that is, cells
with more specific forms and functions. Stem cells are able to divide ad infinitum in
culture media.
340
1.
2.
3.
4.
Long-term self-renewal (often for the life of the organism)
Specialized cell division
Giving rise to differentiated, daughter cells
At least multi-potential developmental capacities.
Among the central concepts in the field of stem cell technology are
those of cell potency and lineage. Stem cell potency is best described
in the context of normal human development. Human development begins
when a sperm fertilizes an egg and creates single cell that has the potential to
form an entire human being. Such a fertilized egg is totipotent, meaning that
its potential is total. In the first twenty-four hours after fertilization, this
cell divides into identical totipotent cells. This means that any one of
these cells, if placed into a woman’s uterus, has the potential to develop
into a fetus. In fact identical twins occasionally develop when two
totipotent cells separate and develop into two individual, genetically
identical human beings. Four to seven days after fertilization, and after
several cycles of cell division, the cells of the developing human being
begin to specialize, that is, to take on different forms and carry out different
functions. In the process of specializing, the cells move in relation to each
other, so forming a hollow sphere of cells, called a blastocyst, but as well as
the outer layer of cells of the blastocyst, there is a fluid-filled space within it
which contains a cluster of cells called the Inner Cell Mass (ICM). The outer
layer of cells of the blastocyst goes on to form the placenta and other
tissues needed to support fetal development in the uterus. The cells of
the ICM meanwhile give rise to virtually all of the tissues of the human
body. However, while ICM cells can form a wide range of other cells, they
cannot form a fetus because they are unable to generate the placenta
and supporting tissues necessary for development in the uterus. The
cells of the ICM hence are not totipotent but pluripotent, from the Latin
plures, meaning “several” or “many”. And because their potential is not
total, ICM cells are not embryos: even if an ICM cell were to be placed
into a woman’s uterus under conditions conducive to pregnancy, it would
not develop into a fetus. Broadly speaking, then, potency can be broken
down into three categories:
1. A multipotent stem cell generates cells only for a particular type of
tissue
2. A pluripotent stem cell can give rise to specialized cells which form
many different tissue types
3. A totipotent stem cell is capable of producing a complete individual.
Stem cells are the units of embryogenesis, they persist throughout
the life of the individual and, therefore, they are also found in children
341
and adults. Consider, for example, the best understood stem cell, the
blood or hematopoeitic stem cell (HSC). 24 Blood stem cells commonly
reside in the bone marrow of every child and adult, and can even be
found in very small numbers elsewhere in the body. These stem cells
perform the critical lifelong role of continually replenishing our supply
of the cells and cell-derived fragments found in the blood, that is the red
blood cells, white blood cells and platelets. A person cannot survive
without hematopoeitic stem cell. All stem cells, hence, are relatively
unspecialized, sitting at the top of the cell-lineage hierarchy. It is important
to restrict such a concept of stem cells to single cells that, once
developed, self-renew indefinitely so that we may distinguish them from
transient, progenitor cells. The product of a stem cell undergoing division
is two cells, including at least one stem cell, that is, a cell which has the
same capabilities as the original cell. A progenitor cell (also known as a
precursor cell), on the other hand, can give rise to only two specialized
cells, and not other progenitor cells. Hence, it cannot renew itself. This
difference between stem and progenitor cells has important implications
for cell therapies and regenerative medicine. In the adult body, stem
cells may divide repeatedly and rapidly to replenish tissue (such as
muscle), or remain quiescent (dormant), as in the mammalian brain.
Regardless of the cell division rate, though all stem cells exhibit the
properties of long-term self-renewal and specialized cell division, but
the ability to generate an array of daughter cells and the plasticity of
stem cells are the two properties that have generated so much recent
interest. Before considering in detail the potential uses, benefits and ethics
of stem cell technology, it would be useful to outline the origins of the
various types of stem cells that have been discovered to date. In
developmental order, those discovered are: embryonic stem (ES) cells,
fetal stem (FS) cells, stem cells from the placenta and umbilical cord
blood (UCB) and adult stem (AS) cells, cells which are actually present
from birth.
Adult Stem cells25
Research on adult stem cells has a curious history. Until stem cells
were discovered, their existence was merely suggested as a way of
explaining how tissues survive despite the relatively short half-lives (the
24
Haematopoietic stem cell (HSC) – the premier adult stem cell from which all blood
cells whether red or white, and platelets are derived.
25
Adult stem cell - An undifferentiated cell found in differentiated adult tissue, able to
renew itself and to differentiate into all the specialized cell types of the tissue from
which it originates. Adult stem cells may also be able to differentiate into cell types
unrelated to their originating tissue.
342
life span of half the population of a particular type of cell) of their common
component cells. Tissues in systems having a high turnover (such as blood,
skin and intestinal epithelium) could survive, it was argued, only if there
were special cells that could divide to produce both exact copies of
themselves and differentiated daughter cells. Subsequently, such stem
cells were indeed shown to exist, and they are now understood to be
essential for the survival of all cellular elements of high turnover systems.
However, even after the first discoveries of such stem cells, they attracted
little attention, except for hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs). We now know
more about HSCs than any other kind of stem cell. Indeed, HSCs qualify
as the premier adult stem cell because of their abilities both to renew
themselves continuously and to give rise to the full complement of cell
types found in the blood. Hematopoietic stem cells reside within the
bone marrow (BM), spleen and liver and, under certain conditions, may
be found in the blood stream and other tissues. Historically, interest in
HSCs has been driven partly by the ready accessibility of the
hematopoietic system and partly, in animal studies, by the ease with
which fractions of cells from bone marrow could be used to rescue the
hematopoietic systems of mice and other animals whose marrow had
been destroyed by chemotherapy or irradiation with X-rays. Research on
HSCs has also been driven by the use of bone marrow transplantation in
human beings, first as a therapy for lymphomas and, more recently, in the
treatment of acquired conditions such as severe forms of certain
autoimmune diseases (such as systemic lupus erythematosis) and
rheumatoid arthritis.
Types of Adult Stem Cells
While HSCs have inspired intensive study, interest in other adult stem
cells has lagged behind. Perhaps the best studied of other adult stem
cells is another type isolated from bone marrow, variously referred to as
fibroblastoid colony-forming units, plastic adherent cells from marrow or
mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs).26 These cells were first discovered in
the 1970s by Friedenstein, who showed that they are capable of
differentiating in the body and in culture into mesenchymal tissue such
as bone, cartilage, muscle, ligament, tendon, adipose (fatty tissue) and
stroma (connective tissue underlayer of, for example, skin). Mesenchymal
26
Mesenchyme – connective tissue arising from multiple germ layers and consisting
of unspecialized cells. It gives rise to a number of cell types including those that produce
collagen, muscle, cartilage and bone.
343
stem cells fascinated a small group of investigators following
Friedenstein’s pioneering work and began to attract wider attention in
the mid 1980s. More recently, though, scientists have observed MSCs
regenerating severed tendon in the rabbit when injected into the
damaged tendon. Such remarkable results offer the promise of
developing artificial forms of tissue regeneration. While adult stem cells
are rare within the body (for instance, in mice, only 1 in 15,000 bone
marrow cells is an HSC), several other types of stem cells have been
isolated, although they have been only partially characterized. Neural
(nerve) stem cells (NSCs) have now been isolated from the mammalian
(including the human) neural system and shown to differentiate (outside
the body) into the three main neural cells of the central nervous system,
namely: neurons (the functional cellular unit of the nervous system),
oligodendrocytes and astrocytes ( both of which primarily support the
surrounding neurons). There is no consensus yet, however, about how
many populations of central nervous system (CNS) stem cells exist, how
they may be related to each other and how they function in the body,
and if they are, in fact, distinct from NSCs.
However, the stem cells within the CNS which have already been
reported belong to three distinct groups; and preliminary evidence
indicates they also occur in the adult human brain. One group of stem
cells occupies the brain tissue next to the ventricles, in regions known as
the ventricular zone and the sub-ventricular zone; a second group of
adult CNS stem cells, located near the olfactory bulb (responsible for
odor processing), has been described in mice but not in humans; and a
third group of stem cells in adult mouse and human brain occurs in the
hippocampus, a part of the brain thought to play a role in the formation
of certain kinds of memory. Much research is now being conducted to
characterize these cell groups more fully, since it may be possible in the
future, once their potential has been ascertained, to utilize them in treating
neural diseases. Another stem cell thought to reside in bone marrow,
apart from the HSC, is the stromal cell. 27 that make up the matrix within
the bone marrow are derived from mesenchyme and give rise to fat and
cartilage cells. In addition to providing the physical environment in which
HSCs differentiate, BM stromal cells can generate mesenchymal tissue,
namely: cartilage, bone, and fat. Whether stromal cells are best classified
27
Stromal Cell – a non-blood cell derived from blood organs, such as bone marrow
or fetal liver, capable of supporting the growth of blood cells in vitro. The stromal cells
344
as stem cells or progenitor cells 28 for these tissues though is still in
question. There is also a question as to whether MSCs and BM stromal
cells could actually be the same cell type under different names.
Dr. Verfaillie’s group in the US may help to clarify this issue through
their characterization of a rare kind of cell termed multipotent adult
progenitor cells, or MAPCs. These cells have now been isolated from rat,
mouse and, importantly, human bone marrow. They have significant
transdifferentiation potential, or plasticity, both in culture and in animal
models. In culture media, MAPCs have differentiated into cell types
characteristic of all three germ layers, including neural cells, epithelium
of the gut and liver, and all blood cell lineages. When injected into young
mouse embryos, human MAPCs were able to contribute to almost all
types of developing tissue, so indicating their pluripotency. And unlike
other adult stem cells isolated to date, MAPCs appear capable of longterm proliferation in culture without loss of potency or change in
appearance or function. Such proliferative ability, coupled with broad
differentiation potential, may make MAPCs an ideal cell source for the
treatment of degenerative diseases. Much work is now going on to
characterize these cells further and exploit their potential in curing disease.
Finally, the status of stem cells in the adult pancreas and liver remains
unclear. During embryonic development, both tissues arise from the
endoderm. A recent study indicates that a single precursor cell derived
from embryonic endoderm 29 may generate both the ventral pancreas
and the liver. In adult mammals, however, both the pancreas and the liver
contain many kinds of differentiated cells that may be regenerated by
many types of stem cells. Stem cells capable of repopulating the liver in
adult humans have still not been identified. Recent studies in rodents
indicate that HSCs (which are derived from the mesoderm) may migrate
to the liver after it is damaged, where they may demonstrate plasticity.
Cloning - Embryonic Stem Cells
The moral problem does not change if cloned embryos, embryos
formed by somatic cell nuclear transfer to enucleated eggs are used.
These cloned embryos would be totipotent, and once implanted in the
uterus, could develop to form a fetus and be born alive, although most
Progenitor Cells – They are partially differentiated cells capable of generating
particular daughter cells. Unlike stem cells, they are unable to divide indefinitely.
28
Endoderm is a inner layer of cells in embryo: in an animal embryo, the innermost
layer that develops into the lining of the respiratory and digestive tracts.
29
345
likely with serious abnormalities. Granted that every human embryo is
worthy of moral and legal protection, the cloning of embryos for the
treatment of diseases or degenerated neural tissue would be as bad as
research aimed at such treatment based on the destruction of normal
human embr yos that had been created by IVF. The use of cloning
technology to create human embryo, fetus or child would be ethically
unacceptable and an affront to human dignity. In addition to the risks of
creating a person with abnormalities, the cloning of children would be
detrimental to their sense of personal identity and family relationships.
The cloned child would be designed and formed on purpose and would
be practically an identical copy of another person; they would not have
a natural father, a genetic mother or the normal genetic family relatives.
The closest to genetic parents that a cloned child would have would be
the mother and father of the donor of the nucleus. There would be a risk
too that such a child would be subject to unreal expectations to behave
like the donor of the nucleus.
Stem cell research using embryonic cells has provoked wonder, fear,
disbelief, excitement and anger. Since 1998, when James Thomson first
reported isolating human embryonic stem (ES) cells, much controversy
has raged both in scientific circles and the broader community
concerning the ethics of ES cell technology. The most troublesome aspect
of ES cell research is undoubtedly the source of these cells. Human ES
cells are derived from the inner cell mass (ICM) of the blastocyst, the stage of
the developing embryo lasting between day four and day seven postfertilization. The ICM, comprising around thirty cells, normally gives rise
to the fetus, while the surrounding cells generate placental material and
membranes to support the developing embryo and fetus. In order to
extract ES cells though, the blastocyst is destroyed, so no further
embryonic development is possible. Thus, embryos from which ES cells
are taken are, by that act, destroyed. Once scientists break up the ICMs of
embryos and place them in culture media in a suitable environment,
they can obtain ES cells which remain in their primitive, or undifferentiated,
state indefinitely. Such cells are pluripotent, that is, they can give rise to
virtually all the tissue types and organs of the body, and for this reason, such
cells are attractive tools in scientific research circles.
Every cell contains genetic material known as DNA in its nucleus.
This DNA is the coded matter which directs the manufacture and strategic
deployment of molecules (e.g. proteins) which all cells need to exist and
to function properly. The nucleus, then, is essentially the brain centre of a
346
cell, co-ordinating and controlling its life and activity. In the laboratory
technique of nuclear transfer, the nucleus of a donor cell is removed and
inserted into a recipient cell, for example, an egg cell, which has had its
nucleus removed (i.e., an enucleated egg cell). The embryo which results
from such an injection of the nucleus of a somatic (body) cell from a
purebred animal into an enucleated egg is a clone of the donor animal,
that is, the resulting embryo is genetically identical to the donor. Nuclear
transfer techniques have been applied to cells from a variety of animals:
amphibians (1952), mice (1983) and, more recently, larger mammalian
species, including cattle and sheep. Hence, even apart from ethical issues,
there are many problems associated with ES cell research. Moreover, the
potential of ES cells to benefit humanity is not established, either
medically or in broader scientific ways.
Future Prospects and Safety Issues
Harm should be avoided not only to embryos but also to any patients
who, potentially, could benefit from stem cell therapies. It is now known
that the use of cloned embryos and the ES cells derived from them
would be very risky since they are likely to be affected by serious
abnormalities. Researchers tend to discount the risk of serious harm from
the “therapeutic use” of cloned ES cells yet these engineered tissues
could well harbor faulty reprogramming. This would be due to the
disruption of the genomic imprinting during the formation of the cloned
embryo. Moreover, if cloned embryos or ES cells were to be used, extreme
care would be needed to detect and manage the erratic proliferation of
cells they stimulate in the form of tumors and cancerous growths. As well
as having an ethically acceptable source of stem cells, stem-cell-based
therapies should be developed that employ cells that function safely
and predictably after transplantation. They need to be genetically stable,
proliferate in a controlled fashion and be capable of migrating only to
the damaged site. These safety issues should be resolved before progressing
to clinical trials. However, the use of pluripotent stem cells created directly
by reprogramming a patient’s own somatic cells would not be unethical
but, as with all potential cell-based therapies, its safety would need to be
verified by research in animal models before clinical trials were to begin.
Such cells, being genetically identical to the patient’s cells, would offer
the important advantage of not being liable to be rejected. Empirical
evidence though remains to be gathered to see if such stem cell therapies
(that do not require the destruction of human embryos) are successful
347
and do not have any harmful side effects. It is, then, morally imperative to
continue research on the safer and ethical alternative, that is, the promising
therapeutic and preventive medical potentials of stem cells which are
not derived by destroying or harming human embryos.
While such research shows extraordinary promise, ethical and
technological challenges remain before such discoveries can be
incorporated into clinical practice: just because modern technology
brings breakthrough does not justify their automatic implementation in
every case, even if they are safe for all concerned in their provision. We
would know well to change our thinking to reflect the changing
landscape in science and medicine: no longer do we need to employ
every device and means at our disposal to prolong and enhance life at all
costs. Rather, we might do better if, as a society, we employed these tools
selectively in ethical and meaningful ways: some techniques may be better
left on the shelf, regardless of the touted benefits. The technological
challenges involved in advancing stem cell science, although significant,
are by no means insurmountable. First, we must do the basic research to
understand the cellular events that lead to cell specialization in the human
body. This will enable us to direct pluripotent stem cells to become the
types of tissue needed for transplantation. Research into what controls
and maintains stem cells must also be performed so that underlying safety
issues can be resolved. This k nowledge would also be useful in
overcoming diseases such as cancer where there is abnormal cell
specialization and proliferation.
Second, before we can use these cells for transplantation, we must
overcome the problem of immune rejection. Because pluripotent stem
cells derived from embryos or fetal tissue would be genetically different
from recipients, future research would need to focus on modifying
pluripotent stem cells to minimize tissue incompatibility problems or on
creating sizeable tissue banks containing the most common tissue-type
profiles. An even more elegant solution to tissue loss and damage would
be to reprogram recipients’ own cells to do the job, overcoming the
ethical concerns of using cells derived from embryos or fetuses. Third, if
we are to utilize stem cells in regenerative medicine, scientists must
have a much greater understanding of tissue regeneration and
organogenesis (organ formation). Whether the replacement tissue be
generated in the laboratory or in the body, scientists need to know a
great deal more about the processes involved and the underlying factors
controlling them. We are still a long way from being able to control and
348
direct tissue repair processes appropriately, especially in relation to
complex organs such as the liver. Underlying all these technical challenges
though is that of finding ethically acceptable sources of powerful,
pluripotent human stem cells which are suitable for clinical application.
Once these challenges are overcome we will certainly be entering a
revolutionary era in medicine.
Future Top Ten Technologies
People usually agree that we are living through a technological
revolution, and at the same time they

01 CHAPTER - Planet chaser

Transcription

Similar documents

Halo Halo! - World Socialist Movement

HOMO GEORGICUS THE HISTORY OF HUMAN EVOLUTION

Women and Heart Disease - Cape Fear Valley Health

Gerber OMEGA™ 5.0 empowers the beginner and propels the expert.

Sportsmaster Brochure

Call them Piccaninnies, Fussy Wussy Angels or just Gods dear little

The Apqell by John Grisham