Subject: Re: [percy-l] Re: Some Random
Thoughts, Largely Unrelated, Based on Previous Discussions and Readings
Aristotle thought the teenagers of his day were
all going to pot. An essay in Percy's Signposts says more (American) men
were killed in the Civil War than WWI and WWII put together. On a
physical level, the 20th century wasn't any worse
than other centuries... On a material level, our lives are
terrific (Percy would agree) and far better than they have been ever (at least
the Northern Hemisphere). The 9/11 tragedy and the wars that are
following it are tragedies of course -- but no worse than those that came
before and actually far less I would say.
However, on a spiritual level, we don't know why
we're here, or who we are -- THIS is what's different about our
century.
On an ETHICAL level, however, I'd have to say
this century is no better or worse than any others... We can still learn
to be "ethical" in this transient, anonymous, capitalist, postmodern
society -- ethical implies a statement about our behavior in the physical
world, and the laws of nature still apply. I.E.: If you're lazy
and don't work, you won't produce and hence you will be fired, become hungry,
and become motivated to work. If you're a freeloader, people will know
it, resent you, abandon you, and you'll soon lose people to freeload off
of. If you cheat and lie, you will (eventually) be found out.
Enron and WorldCom. Being unethical just doesn't work -- in the long run
-- and the structure of the universe will ensure that we learn our lessons and
act ethically to succeed, or not learn our lessons and fail. "What
doesn't work will eventually fail." There are exceptions, of course, but
generally our world -- THE world -- works that way.
However, ethics is different from
spirituality -- though the two are related more often than not.
Spirituality implies a sense of meaning and purpose behind our
actions. Spirituality implies something that is transcendent of the
physical world. Spirituality implies, esp. for Percy, something
human -- different from the animals -- and entails such concepts and
experiences of "joy" and "alienation" and a "soul" and a "dark
night" and "pattern" and "purpose."
In other words, I can act ethically for the
physical rewards/benefits of that and have no spiritual purpose behind it at
all (though spirituality usually entails ethical actions). You referred
to the "Thanatos Syndrome" -- in it you have the characters cavorting about
engaging in all sorts of meaningless sexual acts -- it's not that
that's unethical that is the problem with this -- but that it shows
the absence of spirituality -- there's no meaning or purpose behind what
should be a spiritual act. In TS, the water is tampered with to make a
happy society on a physical plane, but there's no purpose to the happiness, no
transcendent meaning related to that. (In this way, to me, Thanatos
Syndrome is very closely related to Huxley's Brave New World -- in
events and in theme.)
Huston Smith (best known for his "World
Religions" work) has a great little book, a pretty quick read, called
"Beyond the Post-Modern Mind" (1989? though that might not be the first
edition). In it he says the middle ages was an era in which man saw
himself as a creature of God, as a creature with a soul, and his
place in the world was determined by the state of his soul and relationship
with God. So the middle ages was "Man with a soul," which became
usurped in the Renaissance by mind, science, and intellect --
man was "Man with a mind," and in the 20th century, we no longer view our
place in the world as defined by soul or mind, but by body. We are
physical creatures, and that is the end of that.
So, what's wrong with making society productive
on a physical plane (certainly what the Nazis wanted -- Hitler was a Utopian)
and people happy through physical inducement? It lacks any connection to
meaning, purpose, and man's place in the world as it relates to anything
transcendent. It (the postmodern age) lacks a
spirituality.
Subject: Re: [percy-l] Re: Some Random Thoughts, Largely
Unrelated, Based on Previous Discussions and Readings
"Wade Riddick" wrote: > Well, the list appears to have gone
dark, which isn't surprising what with > the increasing corporate
ownership of media and all.
I've been occasionally lurking around for
some months out of interest in Percy's work, surfing the website too. How
about attempting a "revival" with one of my favorite quotations from
Percy:
Sign Posts in a Strange Land, 309:
"The old modern age
has ended. We live in a post-modern as well as a post-Christian age which
as yet has no name....
"It is post-modern because the Age of
Enlightenment with its vision of man as a rational creature, naturally good
and part of the cosmos, which itself is understandable by natural
science--this age has also ended. It ended with the catastrophes of the
twentieth century."
What are we to make of the catastrophes of the 21st
Century? Not off to an especially good start, are we?! Or too gloomy a
quotation to prompt comment?