From: FutureQ (futureq@attbi.com)
Date: Mon Oct 14 2002 - 01:44:55 MDT
Greg Burch wrote:
> But then I realize that there are
> many, many factors weighing against these things: Steadily increasing
> secularism in Europe and the UK, and the generally non-religious nature
> of the vast majority of Chinese people, to name just two important ones.
> Sure, these things are themselves subject to being undermined. I think
> the general post-modernist culture of most European societies erodes
> their ability to resist "Islamicization", but eventually, as J. Corbally
> points out, Europeans will realize they are facing the possibility of
> cultural aggression and will react. Yes, the huge mass of the Chinese
> population has proved itself susceptible to inroads by religious memes,
> but the humanistic (if deeply conservative) tradition of Confucianism
> seems to be strongly immune to fundamental disruption.
Personally I don't think China is that far from religion. Looked at a
certain way communism is the twin of Taoism. Think about. In Taoism you are
born into your lot in life and that just as nature is unchangeable. Sound
any different than the state prescribing one's profession and station? I
think the chinese so readily accepted communism because to them it was
little different than what they knew for thousands of years.
They could easily slip back into Taoism if the communist state failed as I
see coming anyway. Look how quickly the Orthodox Russian church gained
ground when the USSR fell out of favor. Weak people need their crutches
either religious or governmental. The trouble with Taoism is that it's the
ultimate luddite religion. The chinese could have developed rocketry to the
point of world conquest and even perhaps taken humanity to space several
thousand years ago but they didn't because Taoism teaches that nature is
unchanging so why try? It would be interesting to see how readily or not
transhumanism takes in China.
FutureQ
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 09:17:32 MST