From: Brett Paatsch (paatschb@ocean.com.au)
Date: Thu Feb 20 2003 - 05:34:14 MST
Hubert Mania writes:
> > 3) It's counterintuitive but for some strange reason the war
> > supporters seem like nicer people that the anti war crowd;
> > that doesn't mean they're right of course.
>
> No, it is not counterintuitive at all. People who support war
> do the right thing to their ancient brain rudiments which call for
> unconditional defense of your own territory. If you do so, the
> appropriate neuropeptides are released and all you fine young
> cannibals feel pretty relaxed because you have done the right
> thing. That's why you appear to be the nicer people.
This sounds a little piqued Hubert, I mean no criticism by this as I
think that's natural enough given the topic and the strong feelings
many people have of it. But I am interested in your suggestion that
there might be an evolutionary and neurological bias towards
feeling good about supporting a decision to engage in conflict.
I am sceptical myself that this is likely to be a significant bias but
what you saying is not obviously impossible (at least to me) do
you have an data or research to support your view?
For my part I wonder sometimes if my atheism which I think is
a position I've arrived at intellectually rather than emotionally
may bias my perceptions more towards being willing to be
hawkish when the circumstances require it.
I grew up in a Christian tradition (Roman Catholic secondary
school and all) and went through the stages of agnostic to atheist
in my mid to late teens. I think I can still recall and adopt a
religious viewpoint quite easily but I don't know to what extent
my transition from theist to atheist is a unique one. I say this to
identify a possible bias of my own so that I can now say this in
the manner of a open question.
I often wonder if belief in a "higher being" in some ways gets
believers off the hook a bit in having to face what seems to be
a fundamental but unpleasant truth. It certainly seems crystal clear
to me that sometimes we (individual people and groups of people)
simply do have to fight or die when we are confronted by others
who have decided to exercise their choice to regard us as prey.
Yet there are apparently a small but not insignificant percentage
of the population that say that they would oppose war in all
circumstances. This I don't get. I can make sense of it if I consider
that theists are regarding this life as a precursor to another one
- that quite naturally would change the risk/return calculation a bit,
but in the absence of the view that there is another life or that the
supernatural cavalry are going to come to our rescue in this life
(or the next) I really don't get how people could not see that the
loss of their own life and perhaps that of their families, friends,
children who may depend on them is a more acceptable loss that
to fight back in self defence and if necessary kill the predator that
will otherwise kill them and likely others as well.
Could there be a link between theism and pacifism and atheism
and the willingness to take arms against the sea of troubles?
Clearly some theists believe in just wars but are there atheist
pacifists that are willing to be killed by predators rather than
fight back in self defence?
- Brett
(Aside: It would be great if we could have a non-vitriolic
discussion on this folks as I really do want to understand )
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