Is human society destined for self-annihilation or were we made for something better?
Certainly if one listens to the transhumanist gospel by modern pseudo-religious cult leaders like the WEF’s Yuval Noah Harari, Google’s Ray Kurzweil, or perennial spiritual atheist Sam Harris, it might appear that the soul-less computer program that is the human machine is merely a hackable computer whose code will be cracked any day now.
The universe described by these high priests of atheism, who profess to know of the beginning, end, and extremes of everything is a closed system winding down into a supposed heat death which we are told will inevitably wrap its cold meaningless hand around everything in a nihilistic big whimper.
But is this nihilistic projection true?
It certainly appears to be founded upon centuries, if not millennia of scientific thought which has led us inexorably toward these dismal conclusions. So how would we go about trying to prove to ourselves whether or not there is a bigger piece of the story being left out by forces that would prefer it if nihilism were the only conclusion we could possibly arrive at?
Let’s explore this question in a bit more detail.
Aristotle’s Slave-Master Society
Throughout history, a dispute has raged between two opposing paradigms each attempting to infuse very different meanings into fundamental concepts like “human nature”, “law”, “freedom”, “justice” and “God”.
Where one paradigm has tended to look upon the universe as a living process animated by creative growth and a loving Creator in whose image humankind was made, the other paradigm has tended to approach things somewhat differently.
If scientific thought is relegated to the material domain alone, then such transcendental concepts as “soul”, “truth”, “causality”, “design” and “intention” have very little value beyond whatever utilitarian desires an elite wishes be imbued into these words at any given moment in time and space.
Such an arbitrary idea of “freedom” and “truth” was demonstrated by the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle who posited that human nature was forever destined to be controlled by a master class of elites presiding over a slave class.
In his Politics (part V), Aristotle explicitly lays out this view with the sophistication of a racist hillbilly, explaining that since it is evident that his particular society embraced slavery, it was obvious that slavery was built into the fabric of the universe itself. Think I’m exaggerating? Ask Aristotle, who said:
“Is there anyone thus intended by nature to be a slave, and for whom such a condition is expedient and right, or rather is not all slavery a violation of nature? There is no difficulty in answering this question, on grounds both of reason and of fact. For that some should rule and others be ruled is a thing not only necessary but expedient; from the hour of their birth, some are marked out for subjection, others for rule.”
Unlike the elder Plato who strove always for the unifying principle behind all definitions, Aristotle’s world is much more fragmented. After establishing his master-slave dichotomy as a self-evident truth that only fools would question, Aristotle goes on to build up an explanation that there are as many divergent definitions of “virtue” and “justice” as there are statuses in society. For the virtue of a slave could never be equivalent to the virtue of a master, and the justice of a tyrant could never be the same as justice for a subject.
Despite the fact that myth-makers have maintained a lie for centuries that asserts without any authentic evidence, that Aristotle merely “advanced” Plato’s ideas, any honest reading of the works of both men demonstrates two irreconcilable paradigms. More than simply having divergent views of definitions, the WAYS OF THINKING ABOUT THINKING itself are mutually incompatible[1].
Aristotle’s Blank Slate and Impotent God
While Plato demonstrates the superior mental powers of an uneducated slave boy to the superior genetic breeding of the oligarch Meno[2], Aristotle defends the idea that slavery is immutable.
Plato’s proof outlined in the Meno, Phaedo, Gorgias, and Philebus rest upon the demonstrable existence of an immortal soul which must exist for discoveries of universals in nature to be possible.
Aristotle on the other hand posits throughout his writings that no such pre-existent soul with any immortal character needs be assumed to exist since we are all nothing but blank slates to be written on by material experiences.
In his De Anima, Aristotle states: “when we said that mind is in a sense potentially whatever is thinkable, though actually, it is nothing until it has thought? What it thinks must be in it just as characters may be said to be on a writing tablet on which as yet nothing stands written: this is exactly what happens with mind.”
“If the mind is bound to the impressions caused by the senses alone with nothing innate or immortal pre-existing within a child, then “truth” again becomes reduced to relativism. This must be so as nothing universal or eternal is knowable through the finite, and limited senses. For we can see one or many humans, but we cannot see humanity which remains an abstract idea devoid of any principled meaning in this worldview.”
Extending his lifeless utilitarianism beyond considerations of mere humanity, Aristotle goes on to posit that the universe itself is 1) static, 2) eternal, and 3) uncreative. These broad generalizations eliminate the need to even think about a Creator God as having any meaningful role to play in anything.
Caption: Raphael Sanzio’s School of Athens is illustrated with Plato in motion, pointing towards the higher realm of ideas while holding his Timaeus contrasted with the opposing paradigm of Aristotle, stationary in his position with his palm down to the earthly domain holding in his other hand his Nicomachean Ethics
However, since Aristotle also believed in forces that he assumed were “divine” (possibly not wishing to be accused of atheism or impiety), Aristotle posited the existence of “unmoved movers” who he explained were perfect beings that had no power to act upon or understand material creation. Despite the absurdity that Aristotle’s divinity is ultimately impotent, very few thinkers addressed this absurdity.[3]
Using his infamous syllogistic rules of logic which are also the foundation of all computer coding, Aristotle concluded that since A) the Creator is perfect in his unchanging stasis, it follows that B) the fewer things change, that C) the more in harmony they are to God.
From that sequence of logic, it must be concluded that a lifeless rock was more perfect than organisms of the biosphere which cause much greater rates of change than non-living matter. Meanwhile, nothing changes more than the human species due to acts of scientific progress which must mean that we were the most imperfect and furthest removed from God of all creation.
If only a wise elite could reprogram humanity to abandon our unwieldy tendency to leap outside our feudal mediocrity through acts of creative discoveries, then perhaps we could be re-molded to be unchanging, obedient, and thus “good”.
Over the centuries, this worldview evolved in form but retained its core assumptions unchanged.
Kepler Bans Aristotle from Christendom
It is notable that the Aristotelian sleight of hand that turned Plato inside out was exposed by the great Pythagorean astrophysicist Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) in his 1619 opus Harmonice Mundi (Harmonies of the World). Kepler had spent decades proving that the Platonic/Pythagorean hypothesis of the Harmony of the Planets as outlined in the Timeaus dialogue was in fact true.[4]
In this 1619 book, he proves it to be so and demonstrates how he arrived at his 3rd law (aka the Harmonic law) of planetary motion.
In section 4 of this work, Kepler writes of Aristotle:
“Where he [Aristotle] draws a universal conclusion and convicts Plato of the stupidity which is his own fantasy, and finally where to the Platonic picture of the ‘self-taught’ slave he opposes a contrary picture of his own, asserting that the mind in itself is empty not only of other knowledge and of mathematical categories, but also of species, and is just a blank sheet so that nothing is written on it… but everything can be written on it; from this aspect, I say, he is not to be tolerated in the Christian religion.”
In part two of this series, we will explore the revival of Aristotle during the post-Renaissance age under a modified cloak. We will examine some of the major battles that were carried out between Keplerian thinkers led by Gottfried Leibniz in opposition to Aristotle’s leading heirs John Locke and Isaac Newton who attempted to stuff God and his creation back into a cage of mathematical formalism and sense perception.
Footnotes
[1] The single dialogue that critics of my assessment may reference as proof that Plato was just another radical oligarchist is The Republic. However, when one recalls that this work was authored as a mental exercise for students both of his academy and future potential statesmen, one can glean a better appreciation for the traps he sets forth within the unexamined assumptions he permits to leave uncharacteristically unexamined and upon whose foundation, horrific conclusions are drawn. Such a work must induce the perplexed mind of a reader to examine what errors were made within the lines of reasoning that derailed the journey to Justice.
[2] This is done by having the slave solve the problem of doubling a square through the simple posing of questions which demonstrates in a simple manner that the solution was already within the soul of the student who needed to have the flame of discovery lit in a form similar to “recollection” of a forgotten memory. The difference between conventional memory recall and this form of discovery orientation is located in the different time vectors with a memory recall causing our minds to transform from a state of ignorance into knowledge from a one-time vector and a similar transformation occurring during an authentic discovery occurring when wise questions are posed bringing a student into an ontological paradox that must be resolved via the internal creative powers of mentation of the student.
[3] It is an interesting irony that Aristotle was indeed charged with impiety much as Socrates had been 80 years earlier. However, unlike the master who refused to sacrifice his immortality for the sake of preserving his mortality in 399 BC, Aristotle’s fear of death caused him to escape in 323 BC only to die one year later in the court of Macedon.
[4] This was the hypothesis of the harmonic proportions of visual and audible space expressed in 1) the golden section, 2) the construction of the five Platonic solids and 3) the harmonic divisions of a string into consonant proportions that generate intervals which might be found to organize the intervals of planets within a solar system. This theory and its proof were expanded upon by this author in The Pythagorean Revival Needed to Overthrow Today’s Standard Model Priesthood
Matthew Ehret is a Senior Fellow at American University in Moscow and Editor-in-Chief of the Canadian Patriot Review, a BRI Expert on Tactical talk, and has authored 3 volumes of ‘Untold History of Canada’ book series. In 2019 he co-founded the Montreal-based Rising Tide Foundation and can be reached at matt.ehret@tutamail.com
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There is NO Heaven and there is NO Hell! It is what WE allow to be created by Control Freaks and Charlatans using Religions, and Ideologies to brainwash, use abuse, oppress, divide and conquer, the primitive, ignorant, trusting, looking for answer’s masses of humanity, on this beautiful, accommodating Planet of ours while we are travelers on it! Heaven/Paradise is what we could live in, but Hell is what we the Human race has experienced most, during our barbaric-bloody History to this vert day, thanks to Religions and Ideologies! Just take the GOLDEN RULE into our hearts and try to live by IT, we could get close to Paradise, by doing that!
Plato and Aristotle are arguably the best examples of how far the unaided human reason can go in answering the ultimate metaphysical and moral questions. But it’s not far enough. The human mind seeks ultimate causes of things, as well as final causes or ultimate purpose. This means trying to understand who God is.
St Thomas Aquinas was arguably the deepest thinker that ever existed. In the very beginning of his Summa Theologica, he states: I answer that, It was necessary for man’s salvation that there should be a knowledge revealed by God besides philosophical science built up by human reason. Firstly, indeed, because man is directed to God, as to an end that surpasses the grasp of his reason…But the end must first be known by men who are to direct their thoughts and actions to the end. Hence it was necessary for the salvation of man that certain truths which exceed human reason should be made known to him by divine revelation. Even as regards those truths about God which human reason could have discovered, it was necessary that man should be taught by a divine revelation; because the truth about God such as reason could discover, would only be known by a few, and that after a long time, and with the admixture of many errors. Whereas man’s whole salvation, which is in God, depends upon the knowledge of this truth… (continued)
….Therefore, in order that the salvation of men might be brought about more fitly and more surely, it was necessary that they should be taught divine truths by divine revelation. It was therefore necessary that besides philosophical science built up by reason, there should be a sacred science learned through revelation.
(Summa Theologica P.1, Q.1, art.1) https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1001.htm
See also St Thomas’s 5 Ways for proving the existence of God: https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1002.htm#article3
Before birth time (and the spirit world) streched in an infinite direction backwards against the time of birth,
After death, time and spirit world streches in an infinite direcition the other way past the time of death
So if time going one way infinitetly, it goes the other way too infinitely and so eventually, “before and after” meet way out there somewhere in the infinite.
So LIFE is just a miniscule speck of time no matter if you live 27 years or 2700 its just an insignifigant period of time compared to when you were not born, and after you have died, and ones lifespan especially a mere speck of near nothing compared to the spirit world time spent “within” it. (even though there is no time in the spirit world)
SO
What is the purpose of life? To “maintain” the spirit. Whatever that means up to you.
Hope this answers the question in title – (life does of course) as one cant really be doing much at all the rest of the time.
How you define universe I guess the problem – if a bunch of rocks and vacuum and burning stars and black holes, then the universe not too “spiritual” but if universe defined as something akin to the spirit world then there is the other answer; which is life is what “governs” (or “maintains” the universe)
The mind is a fascinating probable cause for any creative dialog with the unknown, of which, it would seem logical, that so called mind stuff made from such created & imaginative equations that linger in the fear of death and the advent of the so called “hereafter”. This Aardvark, when younger, was thought that there is a hereafter and eating ants is just part of natures will for us to survive? The ants would be replaced by natures offspring & what that might evolve into! Looking at the species, we see many types of ants, are they warring to survive with ants of a different species, (tribal or racial differences)? Goodness gracious, have they been affected by the sun’s gamma rays and the light energies of cosmic atomic energy and the evolution of chaos throughout the bombardment of these cosmic and atomic forces unseen with the naked eye? The gaseous firmament of cosmic order and the forces of carbon protons of which we are made. Man’s mind speculates from the most unordinary or extraordinary genetic profiles created by natures whims. Some humans, who have created a philosophical opinion through DNA’s abstract partitions genetic of matter, of whom some believe have beyond average insights into the logistics of mind & matter equivalent to some extraordinary substance of which makes them look like a god, so called created myth & some form of human interactions with others, not so endowed with extraordinary Genetic DNA, =’s fusion of cosmic particles & nature’s sleight of hand.
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