tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-451920464092183110.post4378262742272981563..comments2023-09-19T08:18:44.838-07:00Comments on The Messiah's Blog: Reflowering the Western Spiritual ParadigmDhusharahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16429563425998297239noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-451920464092183110.post-7448134770542438032011-08-13T11:43:33.758-07:002011-08-13T11:43:33.758-07:00I really like this. It touches on things I've ...I really like this. It touches on things I've been thinking about lately.<br /><br />It seems to me that there is one primary challenge in our culture, and that is the belief that death is evil. I'm tempted to write an article called "In praise of pain, fear and death" to lay out my perspective: death is what necessitated reproduction and without it, there'd be no basis for natural selection, no sexual selection, and no us.<br /><br />The problem of believing that death is evil isn't limited to the conventionally religious either. I recently watched a movie called <i>The Transcendent Man</i>, about futurist Ray Kurzweil, and he rails against death in it. So too does new-age conspiracy theorist David Icke in a book I came across recently called <i>Infinite Love is the Only Truth-Everything Else is an Illusion</i> (it's a train wreck I can't put down for the insights into a paranoid mind).<br /><br />Paranoia seems rampant around me today. So even as I consider writing in praise of fear, I see the problems paranoia and panic cause. Plus I don't think anything I write will have the power to change how people really feel about death.<br /><br />Did you see <a href="http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21028156.300-the-end-is-always-nigh-in-the-human-mind.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news" rel="nofollow">this recent article by Michael Shermer</a>?<br /><br />This also reminded me of the new Bill Callahan album, <a href="http://theirbatedbreath.wordpress.com/2011/04/08/bill-callahan-apocalypse-2/" rel="nofollow">Apocalypse</a>.Mike Lewinskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01903441073161313610noreply@blogger.com